Descension Back To Normalcy
by Dream Weaver 85
Summary: Finally, Sam could stand the silence no longer. “I already forgive you all, as hard as that is to believe. I just can’t forget, not yet,” she added quietly. S5 Ascension. SJ and SD friendship with some teamy sweetness thrown in for good measure!
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: **Here's another one I found kicking around my hard drive from waaaaay back in the day. It's a fairly long one but it _is_ complete, so I'm going to be editing chapter by chapter and posting as I work my way through. That being said, I'm now looking for any and all excuses I can get to procrastinate finishing up my thesis, so if there's anything you'd like to see happen in this story, let me know and I'll be more than happy to write it for you: ) Enjoy!

**Descension Back to Normalcy**

Sam Carter pulled the door shut behind her and leaned on it heavily with a sigh. She closed her eyes and massaged her temples wearily.

"I'm assuming that means he didn't go easy on you," Jack O'Neill drawled as sidled up beside her. He crossed his arms over his chest and copied her, leaning on the door to General Hammond's office.

"Actually he did," Sam replied with a grimace. "NID and the Pentagon are begging the President to have me court martialled. The General stuck up for me. He told them I was obeying the orders of a superior officer. He also pointed out that although I did follow an alien through a stargate he built in my basement, I ended up helping said alien save the lives of SG-16, and therefore I don't deserve to be punished."

"I'm sure they were thrilled to hear that," Jack interrupted knowingly.

"Oh they were overjoyed."

"What did the President decide?" Jack asked, ready to barge into the General's office and protest the verdict.

"Since General Hammond is my immediate superior officer, it's up to him," Sam said with a smile. "Which means I get a hug, a reassurance that I won't be charged and two weeks of downtime."

"Good," Jack said, relieved that he wouldn't be losing a member of his team. Looking her up and down, taking in the obvious tension in her posture, he asked, "How are you holding up?"

"I'll be okay," Sam assured with a false smile.

"I don't doubt that you will be. Eventually," Jack countered. "How are you right now?"

"Tired," Sam admitted.

"Come on," Jack said, putting his hand at the small of her back and pushing her off the door. "I'll drive you home."

"You don't have to do that sir," Sam replied quickly.

"I know I don't have to, but I want to," he said, putting more pressure on her back. "Let's go get changed and get out of here."

"Thanks sir," Sam said with a grateful smile as they headed towards the elevator.

"It's the least I can do," Jack said quietly, meaning it more than he wanted to think about.


	2. Chapter 2

Jack pulled up in front of Sam's house and turned the car off. Turning in his seat, he observed Sam for a few minutes. Her head rested on the window and her eyes were closed. Laying a gentle hand on her shoulder, he shook her lightly.

"Carter, wake up," he called softly.

Startled, Sam's eyes flew open and she sat up straight in her seat. "Sir?" she questioned, rubbing her eyes tiredly.

"We're at your place," he told her. "Last I saw, the special forces team was really going to town on your circuit box. Want me to come in with you and see what we can do about it?" he offered.

"Thanks sir," Sam replied with a smile. "Not that it'll make a difference if everything electrical in my house is fried from the power surge that must have occurred after the gate shut off," she added with false levity.

"It's still worth a shot," Jack asserted as he got out of the truck. "Besides," he continued as he shut the door. "I know for sure that your toaster wasn't fried by a power surge."

"No," Sam stated simply. "Instead it was dismantled to build a mini-stargate."

"I take that to mean you'd noticed before you left," Jack joked as he opened the tailgate of his truck and pulled out two flashlights. "Let's take a look," he said positively as Sam shut the tailgate again.

As the two walked up the path to Sam's house, Jack handed her a flashlight. Approaching the house, the full extent of the damage became apparent. The front door was wide open and hanging from one hinge. All glass that could be seen from the front of the house was smashed and both Sam and Jack expected that to hold true throughout the rest of the house. Clicking on their flashlights as they entered the darkened hallway, they surveyed the damage to the interior. Furniture was overturned; holes gaped at them from every wall as well as the floor and ceiling. Everything that could be smashed was and the couch was ripped open. A steady drip could be heard from one corner of the room – one of many pipes that had been punctured by the special forces team.

"You do realize you're not staying here, right?" Jack asked quietly as he watched Sam take in the total destruction of her house.

"It's not a problem, sir," she argued in a lost voice. "It doesn't bother me."

"Liar," Jack declared knowingly. "And even if the broken pipes, torn open walls, lack of power and absence of anything to sleep in or on didn't convince me not to let you stay here, the fact that the door won't close, let alone lock, and your windows are helping to make it very easy for anybody to waltz on in did."

"But…" Sam began.

"No buts," he interrupted, holding up his hand to silence her. "You're staying at my place. Ah!" he cried as she opened her mouth to argue. "No arguments Major, or else I'll make it an order."

"Sir, I can't ask you to…"

"You're not asking – I'm offering," Jack clarified. "Let's go!"

"I should at least shut off the water," Sam argued, knowing she couldn't win and that if she argued, she would find herself hanging upside down over her commanding officer's shoulders, on her way out to his truck. "Try to stop the leaks."

"Uh… The water was shut off just after they got down in your basement. As far as I know, they didn't turn it back on."

"Oh," Sam replied, then, "I really don't want to get any bills for this month."

"Let's go," Jack said gently. "I'll call Hammond from the car and have him send some people over to keep an eye on this place."

"What's the point?" Sam asked dejectedly as Jack led her towards the door. "There's nothing here worth taking. Everything's ruined and none of it is worth fixing."

"It's just stuff, Carter," Jack soothed as they stepped outside. "It can be replaced."

"Did they go up in the attic?" Sam asked, suddenly stopping on the edge of the porch.

"Yeah, I think so," Jack replied slowly. "Why?"

"No reason," Sam said hurriedly, her voice choked. Seeing the scepticism in Jack's eyes, she decided to tell him the truth; it's not like he was buying her white lie anyway. "My mother's wedding dress is up there," she informed him, blinking back tears. "Dad gave it to me after he joined the Tok'ra; I was supposed to keep it safe."

"It'll still be there tomorrow," he said quietly, sliding his arm around her shoulders. "Let's just be glad you weren't in there somewhere when they came in. We can replace all your stuff, but we can't replace you," he reminded, giving her shoulders a gentle squeeze to emphasize his point.

"Sorry about all this, sir," Sam said quietly as he opened the passenger door for her.

"Don't be sorry," he instructed.

"I appreciate everything you've done these last few weeks…" she ploughed on determinedly. "I know I'm a lot more trouble than I'm worth. Thanks for putting up with me," Sam tried to joke lightly as she buckled her seatbelt, but he caught the undertone of sincerity that managed to creep through.

"Let's get a few things straight," Jack said abruptly, turning her head so she was looking him in the eye. "I don't 'put up with you'. I care about you and because I care, I try to help. Driving you home, having you stay with me – that's not me putting up with you, okay?"

"Yes sir," Sam replied mechanically.

"Second, you are _not_ more trouble than you're worth. You're worth a lot more than this… A million times this, maybe," he feigned pausing thoughtfully for a moment, glad when he succeeded in making her smile. "You seem to forget that you've got friends who care about you. When we do things for you, it's us trying to be good friends. Whenever me or Daniel or Teal'c or a thousand other people need something, you're first in line waiting to give it to us. When we try to do the same for you, you act like you're asking too much of us. We want to help you – will you let us?" he asked, holding her gaze.

"Yes sir."

"No – drop the 'sir', Sam. I'm being your friend, not your CO."

"Sorry."

"If I hear you apologize one more time tonight, I'm tying you to the roof racks and driving up to Denver. Don't think I won't," he threatened teasingly.

"I know you too well to think you're kidding," Sam replied with a smile. "Thank you, I needed to hear that," she added more seriously.

"I know," Jack said leaning in to kiss her on the forehead. "Let's call Daniel and Teal'c," he said as he pulled back and shut her door.

Walking around to his side of the truck, Jack opened the door in time to hear Sam ask why they were calling the others.

"We never hang out – pizza and Star Wars," Jack said with a grin.


	3. Chapter 3

"Hey Sam," Daniel greeted her warmly as she opened Jack's front door.

"Hey guys," Sam replied with a smile as she stepped back to let him and Teal'c inside, each with a duffle bag in hand.

"How are you doing," Daniel asked as he pulled her into a tight hug.

"I'm doing better," Sam said as she rested her head on his shoulder.

"We were relieved by General Hammond's decision not to punish you for your actions," Teal'c said earnestly. "However, had he chosen differently, we would have protested. Loudly," he added with an almost smile.

"Thanks," Sam replied warmly as Jack entered the hall with a pile of clothes in his arms.

"Hey kids," Jack greeted with a grin. "Did you bring your stuff?"

"We did indeed, O'Neill," Teal'c assured.

"Couldn't pass up the chance for a sleepover, could you Danny Boy?"

"With Sam? Never," Daniel with an evil smile as he reluctantly let go of her.

"Here you go Carter," Jack said, handing over the pile of clothes. "Something in there's got to fit."

"Thanks," Sam called over her shoulder as she disappeared from the hallway.

"Is she all right?" Daniel asked quietly after following her retreating back out of sight.

"No," Jack answered just as quietly. "One minute she's smiling and happy like she just was, and the next she's near tears and looking like a little girl whose puppy just died."

"The alien Orlin told Major Carter that he loved her prior to his death," Teal'c informed Jack matter of factly.

"What?"

"It's on the tapes they recorded," Daniel explained, his disgust evident from his tone. "General Hammond thought we had a right to know, since it'll probably have a lot to do with how she handles this."

"What did she say to him?" Jack asked, intrigued. Sam had gotten pretty adept at dealing with infatuated aliens they encountered off-world, but none of _them_ had ever followed her home and camped out in her house for over a week.

"To the General?" Daniel questioned in confusion.

"To the _alien_," Jack elaborated, stressing the word purely out of exasperation.

"Uh, nothing really."

"Major Carter will likely be upset to hear you refer to Orlin in such a way," Teal'c advised Jack, the warning in his voice clear.

"She's already upset," Jack pointed out, feeling compelled to state the obvious.

"And you don't have to make it worse," Daniel snapped, flying into over-protective best friend mode at the thought of someone hurting Sam.

"I've spent the last two hours making it _better_," Jack defended himself testily. "And as upset as she is about _Orlin_, she's more upset that none of us trusted her!"

"She will be more upset if we are arguing when she returns," Teal'c pointed out tactfully, trying to forestall any further sniping.

"Is her place really that bad?" Daniel asked as he followed Jack into the living room.

"Everything is ruined. Anything that could have been saved is toast because the pipes are dripping water all over. We didn't go in any further than the kitchen, but that was bad enough," Jack apprised, flopping tiredly onto the couch.

"Major Carter's possessions can easily be replaced," Teal'c interjected as he sat cross-legged on the floor.

"Some stuff can't be replaced, though. Pictures of her with her mom or even with her dad when she was younger might be restorable, but we can't replace them," Daniel pointed out, sprawling into the reclining chair with a sigh.

"She was really upset about her mom's wedding dress," Jack informed them.

"What has happened to it?" Teal'c questioned.

"We don't know it – it was in the attic."

"I'll go look for it when we head over there tomorrow," Daniel promised. "It might not be as ruined as she thinks."

"What might not be as ruined as who thinks?" Sam asked as she entered the room.

Taking in the sight of her in a t-shirt that was at least five sizes too big and a pair of sweat pants that were held up – barely – by a drawstring, Jack thought she looked even more exhausted, if that was even possible. His concern abated slightly when she literally threw herself into the chair Daniel already occupied and he did his best to bite back a smile.

"A topographic map Lieutenant Laden from SG-7 slaved over for days before falling asleep while she was working on it and spilling coffee all over it," Daniel lied casually, shifting in the chair to make more room for her.

"Sounds like something Danny would do," Jack said flippantly, standing up. "I'm gonna go get changed, then we can start the movie."

"Did you order the pizza yet?" Daniel asked, following Jack's lead and extracting himself from the tangle of limbs and standing to go get changed.

"It should be here any minute now," Sam promised, playfully pouting at him over 'abandoning' her.

"I shall change as well now, Major Carter," Teal'c informed her as Daniel and Jack left the room.

"Okay," Sam replied as she stretched out in the chair, shifting into the space that had been warmed by Daniel's body heat.

She watched Teal'c round the corner leading down the hall and heaved a tired sigh. The second she was alone in the room, the smile dropped from Sam's face and she closed her eyes to try and hold back the tears that were threatening to spill. Taking deep breaths she tried to calm herself down, knowing that at any second one of her friends could re-enter the room.

Short moments later, a sharp knocking on the front door announced that the pizza had arrived and Sam pushed all thoughts of Orlin from her mind. Taking one last deep, she wiped her eyes to make sure no tears had escaped, stood up and headed to the door.


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N:** I finished fiddling with this chapter ahead of schedule (yay insomnia!) but it's now 1:30am, so I make no promises about the quality of my editing. : ) I'm hoping to get the next chapter up by tomorrow night and another one up on Sunday, so keep an eye out for at least two more updates this weekend. And now on with the show… Enjoy!

Grabbing a handful of empty beer bottles, Daniel trailed Jack into the kitchen and deposited the bottles on the counter. Fixing the older man with a pointed look, Daniel crossed his arms over his chest expectantly and waited.

"What?" Jack asked testily while rummaging in the fridge to retrieve another round of beers.

"We need to talk to her, Jack," Daniel murmured, keeping his voice low so that he couldn't be heard from the living room where the rest of the team waited.

"She's _fine_, Daniel," Jack retorted in exasperation.

"She is _not_ 'fine', you said so yourself when Teal'c and I first got here," Daniel argued. "We screwed up, Jack. Big time. We screwed up and Sam paid for it and now we need to talk to her and try to fix this mess."

"She doesn't _want_ to talk about it," Jack hissed, turning on his heel and marching back into the living room, effectively ending the conversation.

Rejoining the others, Daniel settled himself on the couch beside Teal'c and accepted the beer bottle Jack waved at him. Fiddling with the damp label, Daniel studied the woman sitting across the room from him. When they'd first arrived, Sam had been her usual good-natured self. But as the night wore on, she'd gradually withdrawn from them, obviously lost in her own thoughts. All things considered, Daniel was surprised that Sam had even bothered staying downstairs with them. If their positions had been reversed, Daniel didn't think he'd have been too fond of spending the night with his teammates.

Setting the bottle on the wooden coaster in front of him, Daniel watched sweat trace its way lazily down the smooth glass and mulled over the events of the last few weeks. He, Jack and Teal'c had certainly screwed up; there was no denying it. Even after everything they'd seen and done since stepping through the stargate for the first time, when push came to shove they'd found it easier to believe that Sam was losing her mind than to accept the possibility that an invisible alien had followed her home. Heaving a sigh, Daniel looked up and opened his mouth to speak. He snapped it shut again when he noticed the death glare Jack was aiming at him.

"I wish to offer you my apologies, Major Carter," Teal'c spoke up a heartbeat later, earning him his very own death glare. "And I ask your forgiveness."

Sam's eyes landed on Teal'c and she offered him a tentative smile before quietly protesting, "You have nothing to apologize for."

"Yes he does," Daniel contradicted, shooting Jack a pointed look. "We all do."

"Look," Sam began, taking a deep breath. "I'm not thrilled about what happened, but I understand _why_ it happened."

"Well I don't," Daniel shot back. "You're supposed to be able to trust us to have your back and when it really counted, we wrote off your claims as 'crazy talk', abandoned you to the alien that moved into your house without your permission and let the NID establish round-the-clock surveillance on you."

"Daniel!" Jack barked warningly, his eyes narrowed.

"You had no reason to believe me," Sam murmured, her gaze locked on the half empty pizza boxes sitting open on the coffee table so that she wouldn't have to look any of them in the eye.

"We had your word, Major Carter," Teal'c said gently, sitting up straighter. "We should have needed no other reason to place our faith in you."

The gentle tone of his voice finally drew her attention up from the pizza boxes and locked her eyes onto Teal'c's face. Daniel almost wished it hadn't; the raw hurt etched into her features made his chest ache.

"I'm not crazy," she whispered, the words spoken so softly that Daniel barely heard them.

"No," Jack breathed quietly but firmly. "You're not."

Sam shifted her attention to him, studying his face for any trace of doubt that may have lingered there. Daniel took a few seconds to study Jack himself and failed to find anything. Refocusing his attention on Sam, he noticed that she still didn't look very reassured.

"But it was easier to think that I _was_ than it was to trust me," she stated matter of factly long moments later. "And… And I think I'm having a hard time accepting that," she confessed.

"We all are," Jack assured, idly rolling his beer bottle between his hands.

The foursome lapsed into silence and each devoted their full attention to studying the various objects in the room, anything to avoid looking at one another. Tension weaved its way through the quiet that settled over them, a rare awkward silence that left them all feeling off-balance. They were used to the sorts of silences that could stretch on forever without feeling strained, the kind where they could enjoy one another's company without uttering a single word. At the moment, the group gathered in Jack's living room was a long way from being those other people.

Finally, Sam could stand the silence no longer. "I already forgive you all, as hard as that is to believe. I just can't forget, not yet," she added, quietly.

"We betrayed your trust, Carter," Jack admonished, trying to chase away the illogical guilt that shone from her eyes. "You won't forget that, but that's on us, not you. Stop beating yourself up."

"But…"

"Sam," Daniel interrupted gently, "You didn't do anything wrong."

Shaking her head, Sam started again. "When I went in after Orlin tonight…"

"You didn't do anything wrong," Jack echoed Daniel's words, fixing her with a pointed look. His brown eyes held her blue ones for a few moments. When he was sure she'd understood, he nodded slightly and glanced at his other two teammates.

"So, what now?" Daniel asked, glancing between the other three. Forgiveness was all fine and good, but the trust they'd established between them over the years had taken quite a beating in the last few weeks. It would take more than a round of apologies to build it up again.

"Now we hang out and watch Star Wars," Jack replied with a shrug, as though it was the most obvious thing in the world. To him, it was. His team had built the trust between them by practically living in one another's back pockets for weeks at a time. The fastest way to repair those bonds, in Jack's opinion, would be to spend as much time together as possible in the next little while, giving them all a chance to fall back into their familiar rhythm.

"Just like that?"

"Indeed," Teal'c bowed his head, a ghost of a smile on his face. He had no doubt that their relationships would recover; it would just take a little bit of time and patience. As far as he was concerned, there were worse ways to nurture those relationships than watching his favourite movies with his closest friends.

"And we're all okay with this plan?" he checked, pinning Sam with an inquiring gaze.

After a moment's hesitation, she graced him with a shy smile and agreed, "Provided I don't have to watch the movie in this big chair all alone, yeah, we're all okay with this plan."

Offering her a smile of his own, Daniel recognized the opportunity she was offering to start mending their friendship. Standing and stretching, he plucked his beer off the table and moved it over to the table beside Sam's chair before making his way over to the DVD player.

"Major Carter," Teal'c piped up as Daniel slipped the disc into the machine, "I hope you will allow me to offer my assistance in rectifying the damage that your home has sustained at the hands of the NID."

"Uh, what he said. I think," Jack chimed in, his tired brain sluggishly processing what Teal'c had _actually_ just said.

"Me too. Three. Whatever," Daniel added, grabbing the remote off the top of the entertainment centre.

"Gladly," Sam replied and even with his back to her, he could tell she was wearing a warm smile just from the tone of her voice.

As the familiar theme music began, Daniel playfully shoved Sam to one side of the chair and sat himself down on the other. As he'd expected, she slid back over into his half as soon as he was settled and dropped her head to his shoulder. Glancing around at his teammates, he felt a wave of relief wash over him. He knew they were still a long way from being okay, but they had cleared the air and they all felt better for it. They had made progress tonight and he was grateful for it.


	5. Chapter 5

"Mmm… Pizza," Jack said as he reached for another piece from the boxes spread out on the coffee table.

"That's the eighth piece you've had," Daniel observed disbelievingly.

"_And_ you've had just as many beers," Sam added from her spot, curled up quite comfortably against Daniel's right side.

"So?" Jack asked, not seeing their point. After five years, he was far past the point of caring what his teammates thought of his eating habits.

"So we will have to watch Star Wars again tomorrow," Teal'c answered with a large smile. "Otherwise you will not recall the second half of the movie."

"You just want us to re-watch the movie. Again," Daniel stated wryly as he idly ran his fingers through Sam's short hair.

"If O'Neill can force me to go fishing, I can force him to watch Star Wars repeatedly," Teal'c stated smugly, a satisfied smirk creeping over his features to replace the rare smile.

"And that means we have to suffer, why?" Sam asked sleepily.

"Unfortunately, I think we're innocent victims caught in the crossfire," Daniel noted wryly as the credits rolled past on the TV screen.

"Well, since we're all on downtime for a week, why don't we all go fishing?" Jack suggested with evil glee as he hit the stop button on the remote.

"I'd rather clean up my place with a toothbrush," Sam groaned as she hid her face in Daniel's shoulder.

"I'm just joking," Jack assured. "Maybe next weekend."

"Tomorrow we're cleaning your place up," Daniel reminded her with a poke in the shoulder to make sure she didn't doze off.

"I'd appreciate your help, but if you have something else to do…" Sam started.

"We went through this already," Jack said, standing up. "Don't tell us you don't want to be any trouble. And don't apologize either," he continued, walking to the DVD player and ejecting the disc. "I've had way too much to drink to make it to Denver."

"Yes sir," Sam said, grabbing Daniel's arm and wrapping it around her waist as a pre-emptive move against Jack's predictable reaction to her use of the 's' word.

Jack smiled, hearing the suppressed giggle in her response. After their team heart-to-heart, playful, silly Sam had replaced withdrawn, morose Sam and the tension between them all had eased. But Jack wasn't foolish enough to believe that a simple conversation was enough to make everything wonderful between the four of them.

Sam was a decent actress when she had to be, but not good enough to convince him that she didn't still feel the sting of being betrayed by him, Daniel and Teal'c. Jack was pretty sure that at least some of the playfulness was for their benefit, an attempt to assuage some of their guilt for not believing her over the last few weeks. He also suspected she was trying to mask her feelings about her alien housemate's death, in light of the fact that Orlin had claimed to love her, but that was nothing more than a guess on Jack's part. Regardless, he could understand what she was trying to do and was willing to do his part to help.

Hiding his smile, he turned around and menacingly stalked towards her. "What did you just say?" he growled, his voice low.

"_Sorry sir_, it won't happen again," Sam said, mischievously emphasizing the two worst 's' words in the English language.

"That's it!" Jack yelled. He dove at the chair, making Sam squeal and Daniel scramble over the arm to get out of the way.

"I'm sorry! I'm sorry! Put me down!" Sam squealed as Jack threw her over his shoulder and headed up the stairs. Realizing her faux pas, Sam tried to correct it, crying, "I'm not sorry! I'd do it again! Put me down!"

"Oh not you don't!" Jack replied, "You're not getting away with it this time!" he swore as he charged up the last few steps.

Confused, Daniel and Teal'c followed Sam's squeals up the stairs and into the spare bedroom. Once there, they found Jack struggling to simultaneously pull back the covers on the bed and keep a hold of Sam's squirming body.

Teal'c stepped forward silently and pulled the blankets back, figuring it would be better if no one needed to see Doctor Frasier at three o'clock in the morning to have broken bones set. Both of his eyebrows were steadily creeping higher and higher up his forehead. The antics of his human teammates never failed to surprise him; even when he thought they couldn't possibly get any stranger, they found a way to do just that.

As soon as the dastardly obstacle known as bed sheets was dealt with, Jack gently dumped his wriggling, giggling prisoner on the bed. In one final demonstration of absolute power, he pulled the covers up to her chin and tucked them snugly around her.

"That's a punishment you won't soon forget," Jack declared as he dropped down on the edge of the bed dramatically.

"Neither will we," Daniel added. "Did we miss something?"

"Nothing important," Sam assured trying and failing to stop a yawn.

"Good night O'Neill, Daniel Jackson, Major Carter," Teal'c said, knowing that a hasty escape was the better part of valour when his teammates were being particularly rambunctious. He bowed his head at each of them in turn before making his way back to the living room to kel'no'reem, a chorus of 'goodnights' following him down the hall.

"He definitely has the right idea," Daniel echoed, leaning down to brush a few wayward locks of Sam's hair from her eyes. "See you guys in the morning."

"Take my bed tonight Danny," Jack instructed. "I'll take the couch."

"Nah," Daniel replied turning quickly and waiting until he was a step away from the door before adding, "Unless, of course, you plan on getting me into bed the same way you did Sam!" He quickly ducked out of the room to avoid the pillow that was thrown at him. Daniel would never be the one to break it to Jack, but the couch was infinitely more comfortable than the older man's bed.

"Night Carter," Jack said quietly as he got to his feet. Leaning down, he surprised them both by kissing her on the forehead for the second time that night. Before heading for the door he pinned her with a serious gaze. "Promise me you'll never do that to me again," he demanded gently.

"Do what?" Sam asked in confusion. Judging from the tense posture he'd assumed and the dark look that had crossed his face, she knew he wasn't talking about her slipping up in the 's' word department, but he'd made it clear earlier that he didn't blame her for disobeying his order back at her house.

"_That_. Back in your basement," he explained. When it became clear that she still wasn't sure what he was talking about, he heaved a heavy sigh and elaborated.

"When the Special Forces team decided to move in, I told myself that they were trained professionals and I almost convinced myself that when they found you in there, no one would have an itchy trigger finger," Jack told her honestly. "When they made it to the basement and nobody could find you, I was relieved for a fraction of a second. Then I saw the stargate and realized that it may have been better for one of the Special Forces guys to shoot you. Christ, Carter! I didn't know if you'd gone through willingly or if he'd dragged you through kicking and screaming. I didn't know if you were even _alive_," he paused, scrubbing a hand through his hair wearily.

"I never meant to make you worry," Sam said quietly, both surprised and touched at the depth of emotion he was allowing her to see. Even though he wasn't saying it, she knew that he was asking her never to scare him like that again.

"I had to call Hammond to tell him, and Daniel, Teal'c and Frasier were waiting with him to find out what had happened. Do you know how hard that was?"

"I'm sorry," Sam apologized, sincerely regretting the fear and worry she'd put all of them through. "There was no time to think about it or tell you what I was doing. The gate was open and I knew Orlin would never be able to convince SG-16 to abort the test alone. I also knew that the Special Forces team was coming in and that they'd never just let me go..."

"Carter, _I _convinced that team to send you in – if anything had happened to you, it would have been my fault," he interrupted, the guilt plain on his face for a split second before his familiar mask of indifference slipped back into place.

"It was my choice, not yours," Sam argued.

"We could argue back and forth all night," Jack sighed, calm once more as he turned to leave the room. "But we won't. All that matters is that you never ever do that to me again."

"Night sir," Sam said quietly, intentionally not making any promises.

"Night Carter," Jack replied as he left the room, recognizing her avoidance but not calling her on it.

As Jack's footsteps faded down the hall, Sam rolled on to her left side and curled up in a ball. The instant she was alone, the happy and relaxed attitude she'd affected disappeared and was replaced by the tumult of pain she'd been struggling to keep at bay all night long. She knew she would be left alone for hours, so she didn't bother to fight the tears burning her eyes anymore. Burying her face in the pillow to muffle her sobs, she finally allowed herself to grieve for Orlin and the unwavering faith in her teammates that had been battered so badly in the last few weeks.


	6. Chapter 6

**A/N: **I'm snowed in for the day, so I finished the next chapter ahead of schedule! I'll do my best to get another chapter out a little later today, but I can't promise anything since my Internet connection is being temperamental. A huge thank you to everyone who's read (and reviewed!) so far: ) I hope the rest of the story lives up to your expectations!

**Descension Back To Normalcy**

"Oh my God," Daniel breathed as Sam's house came into view just after ten o'clock the next morning. "You actually thought you could _stay_ here last night?"

"I'm a big girl, Daniel," Sam snapped tiredly as he expertly parked in a barely big enough space on her unusually busy street. "I'm not afraid of the dark."

"Are you afraid of what can happen if you can't lock your doors or windows?" Daniel countered without a hint of anger in his voice. "Because I am."

"I know," Sam replied with a sigh.

_Are you? _She thought uncharitably even as she said the words. _You didn't seem too concerned when a total stranger from another _planet _was walking through solid objects to pay me little visits at home._

"Sorry," she apologized without elaboration a moment later. He didn't need to know that she was apologizing for the nasty thoughts chasing through her head and not for over-reacting to his concern.

"Don't worry about it," Daniel replied, shrugging it off and getting out of the car. "The only thing you should worry about right now is what paint chips Jack and Teal'c will come back with."

"How did I let him convince me it was a good idea for the two of them to pick paint colours?" Sam asked as they walked up to the front door together. Yes, Jack had bounced the idea off her over breakfast, but she'd already been more than halfway through her second cup of coffee by then. There was really no excuse for agreeing to allow two men whose favourite colours were _actually _peridot and concrete grey to make decisions about the interior design of her house.

"Puppy eyes," Daniel reminded as he pushed the partially open door open wider and allowed her to pass. "And he got Teal'c in on the act."

"Remind me to…" Sam trailed off as she stepped inside and let her eyes adjust to the relative darkness of the house. "Wow!" she exclaimed, looking around. What she could see of the house had been cleared of all the destroyed furniture that had littered the floor last night and some of the worst holes in the walls had already been replaced by fresh drywall.

"Oh good, you're here," Major Feretti greeted as he walked past the two newest arrivals. "The plumber wants to talk to you downstairs about pipes cracking, the window guy left brochures on the kitchen floor, the counter guy left his on what's left of the counter in the bathroom and the floor guy is upstairs right now."

"You guys have been busy," Daniel observed. "How long have you been at this?"

"Siler and his group left about an hour ago. They got here around midnight," Feretti replied, pressing himself flat against the wall behind him in order to allow a member of SG-5 to haul the remains of a table out through the front door. "Oh yeah! Your stuff is under tarps in the backyard. We sorted it into stuff we might be able to save and stuff that's probably gone."

"Do I want to know which pile is bigger?" Sam asked, making a face.

"Probably not," Feretti responded with a grimace. "Could one of you let the door guy in? He should be here any minute now," he added as he headed out the front door.

"You do it," Daniel instructed, squeezing back against the wall as the remains of what looked like it had once been a bookshelf were carted outside by a member of SG-11. "I'm going to go see what I can do to help out."

"Okay," she replied distractedly as she turned her head to follow her destroyed furniture's journey out to a waiting pick-up truck already loaded down with large pieces of broken wood. "Wish me luck."

"Why?" Daniel asked, his forehead furrowing in confusion. After all, picking a new front door was nothing compared to saving the planet from aliens with a god-complex on a semi-regular basis.

"_They_ should be here soon."

"You need a miracle Sam, not luck," Daniel chuckled as he made his way up the stairs, dodging various SGC personnel hauling an assortment of destroyed furniture out of the house.

Heading into Sam's bedroom, Daniel stopped and asked a member of SG-3 if the attic had been cleared out yet. Receiving a 'no', he opened the closet doors and found the stairs that led up to the attic already unfolded. Climbing the short flight of steps, he found himself looking around a completely destroyed room. It didn't take long for him to find the remains of Sam's mother's wedding dress. It lay in a puddle on the drenched floor beside a ransacked black steamer trunk. Picking up the sopping mess revealed that it was ripped in half and then slashed in several places for good measure.

"Daniel?" a voice called up from the bedroom.

"Up here," he responded loudly. Twisting the dripping fabric delicately, he tried to wring out the dress without exacerbating the damage the NID had done to it. As he did so, his dislike of the organization ratcheted up another notch. It was one thing to destroy Sam's house under the pretense of searching it; intentionally destroying irreplaceable items whose only value was sentimental in nature was just downright cruel.

"Did you find…" Jack began as he bounded up the stairs. Upon seeing the mess of white material in Daniel's hands he didn't bother finishing the question. "Oh boy!" he added, shaking his head in dismay.

"I'm going to sneak it downstairs and hide it in my trunk, but don't tell Sam," Daniel informed him, gently gathering the dress into a ball that he hoped would be small enough to inconspicuously remove from the house. "So, how did the paint thing go?"

"She can't be mad at me," Jack announced smugly, rocking back on his heels and jamming his hands into his pockets.

"Why not?" Daniel demanded, eyes narrowing in suspicion.

"I brought her back every paint chip in the store," he said with a smirk, proud of himself for finally managing to outsmart his genius 2IC.

"When we get stuck painting multi-coloured stripes on the walls, I'm going to kill you," Daniel groaned.


	7. Chapter 7

**Descension Back To Normalcy**

"Thanks for everything guys," Sam said as she set half a dozen pizza boxes on the floor of her kitchen. "As payment for help, I bring you food," she joked as Major Griff set another ten boxes on the floor.

"Mmm… Pizza," Jack called out from the backyard. If it hadn't been for the last ten minutes he'd just spent fighting various pieces of hardware into the correct position, he would have poked his head through the vacant window frame and grabbed an entire pizza for himself.

"As I recall, up until half an hour ago you'd done no actual work, sir," she reminded grudgingly, her tone sounding as though she was seriously contemplating withholding food from him.

"Oh sure. Last night I fed you, clothed you and gave you somewhere to sleep. Bite the hand that feeds you, why don't you?" Jack groused, triumphantly dropping his screwdriver in the grass now that all of the pieces were in their proper places. "And here I am installing the lock on your new front door."

"Carter, feed him if for no other reason than to make him shut up," Feretti instructed as he grabbed a box of pizza and ran upstairs to feed the kind souls who were upstairs removing all the smashed tiling from her bathroom.

"Thanks for everything sir," Sam said with a smile, acquiescing and handing him a slice through the window. "I appreciate it."

"Pay me back with pizza," he mumbled around a mouthful consisting of half the slice. "I'm almost done," he added after swallowing but thankfully before cramming the second half in his mouth.

"We're done hauling the big stuff out. I'll help you get the door up," Sam offered, dutifully handing another piece of pizza out the window at his pleading look.

"You're going shopping with me now," Daniel reminded as he rounded the corner. Stealing the slice out of Jack's hand halfway through its journey to the older man's mouth, he added something that sounded vaguely like, "Yum, green peppers – Jack's favourite," through a mouthful of pizza.

"Did they take everything at the dump?" Jack asked, stealing his beloved pizza back with a glare.

"They did indeed, O'Neill," Teal'c intoned, announcing his arrival.

"I should stay here and help," Sam argued against Daniel's reminder. She shrugged and added, "Besides, I can't exactly afford new furniture right now."

"Oh! I forgot to tell you ma'am," Graham Simmons interrupted as he came to grab a few boxes of pizza for the group busy tearing down the destroyed sheets of drywall throughout the house. "General Hammond wanted me to tell you that the air force is going to foot the bill for fixing your house up, as well as all of your credit card bills from the… From Orlin," he hastily corrected himself when three-quarters of SG-1 glared at him through the empty window frame.

"There you go," Jack said, clapping his hands together. "Get out of here."

"Still, I should…"

"Still, you should go," Janet Frasier declared as she marched into the kitchen and surveyed the room, taking stock of the damage that had been done. "I'm here now and I promise I'll keep the boys in line."

"You're outvoted Sam, let's go," Daniel urged impatiently, tossing his keys from one hand to the other.

"Bring back beer!" Jack exclaimed suddenly, the seemingly tangential remark earning a raised eyebrow from Teal'c. "The big guy'll pay for it!"

"I am _not_ scamming the _President of the United States_ out of _beer money_!" Sam enunciated each word carefully, fixing him with an incredulous look.

"Oh well, no one's perfect," Jack sighed disappointedly.

"Some are significantly closer to perfection than others, O'Neill," Teal'c deadpanned, the dig made obvious only by the amusement sparkling in his warm brown eyes.

Turning away from the window, Sam headed out the front door and around the side of the house before she could be dragged into the brewing argument. She snagged Daniel's arm, gave Janet a sympathetic smile and waved at the others over her shoulder before hustling Daniel away. As much as she hated the idea of shopping to furnish her _whole_ place, she was relieved that it got her away from the crowd swarming through her house. She appreciated all of their help and was touched by the number of volunteers who had turned out, but it was all a bit overwhelming.

"You can drop the act now, Sam," Daniel advised gently as he slid into the driver's seat.

"What?" she asked, feigning confusion as she focussed an inordinate amount of attention on pulling the car door shut behind her.

"No one's around now," he elaborated, sliding the key into the ignition and starting it up. "You can stop pretending you're okay."

"I really am fine Daniel," Sam lied, hoping she could convince him to drop the subject.

"I heard you last night," Daniel confessed as he pulled out onto the road and carefully made his way down the street, dodging various SGC personnel hauling trash out to the fleet of pick-ups lining the street. "All night bawling your eyes out doesn't seem very 'fine' to me."

"I thought I was quiet enough that you wouldn't hear," she mumbled sheepishly, dropping her gaze to her hands in her lap.

"I don't think Jack or Teal'c heard," he offered, more to ease her embarrassment than because he really believed the other two hadn't noticed. "I didn't know if you wanted to be left alone or not, so I stayed on the couch…" he trailed off, unsure of whether he had made the right decision.

"Thanks," Sam said quietly. "For leaving me alone. And for not bringing it up in front of the others."

"So how are you really?" he questioned, sparing a glance at her. "The truth this time."

"It hurts, Daniel," Sam confessed, focussing on her hands folded in her lap. "He cared about me and he died. Just like Martouf and Lantesh, and before them Jonas… It's not fair."

"I know," he soothed, placing his right hand over hers and rubbing his thumb back and forth across the back of her knuckles.

"The only thing any of them did wrong was care about me; they didn't know I'm cursed. I should have to wear a sign around my neck that warns people about me or something," Sam stated. She realized it sounded ridiculous, but given all the things they'd seen in the last few years, she wasn't totally willing to discount the possibility that maybe she really _was_ cursed.

"You're not cursed," Daniel reasoned. "You've had some rotten luck when it comes to love, but you're not to blame. None of this is your fault."

"I'm afraid that next time someone dies, it's going to be one of you," she murmured, near tears again for the umpteenth time in twenty-four hours. "I couldn't take losing one of you too."

"You're not going to lose us Sam," he reassured, even though they both knew it was a promise he couldn't keep. There was nothing else he _could_ say, really; he shared the same fear and had yet to hear anyone say something that actually chased it away, even temporarily.

Falling silent, Daniel drove to the nearest furniture store while Sam stared listlessly out the window. The drive lasted almost half an hour, most of which Sam spent lost in thought and Daniel passed by casting frequent glances over at her, trying to discern what was going through her head. It wasn't until he pulled into the parking lot that she was dragged from her thoughts.

In silence, Daniel got out of the car and waited for her in front of it. Following his lead, Sam got out and slammed her door shut. Walking around the front of the car, she moved right up into his personal space and hugged him as tightly as she could.

"I'm sorry I've been so impossible to deal with lately," she apologized sincerely into his shoulder.

"You're not impossible Sam," he assured as his arms went around her. "You've been through a lot, especially lately. We understand," he said into her hair as held her tightly against his chest. "We want to help you get through this; you've just got to let us."

"Colonel O'Neill said the same thing."

"Then it must be true – Jack and I _never _agree," Daniel stated wryly before reluctantly letting her go. "Now, let's get this whole furniture shopping thing out of the way."

"My thoughts exactly," Sam said with the same grim smile she usually reserved for the midst of battle. "Sorry you got dragged into this."

"I volunteered," Daniel reminded, grabbing hold of her hand and walking towards the store at a relaxed pace. "Anyway, better me than Jack or Teal'c."

"Can you imagine trying to explain annoying, overbearing sales people working on commission to Teal'c?" Sam asked rhetorically, threading her fingers through his. "I owe you for saving me the trouble."

"Nah, I did it more for me than for you. I hate cleaning," he informed her, pitching his voice low so the last part came out as a conspiratorial whisper.

He was rewarded with a laugh and he savoured it, the genuine joy it carried a welcome contrast to the heart-wrenching sobs he'd listened to last night. He knew the levity would be short-lived and interspersed with stretches of solemnity and awkwardness, but every time he was permitted to glimpse the lighter side of Sam, he felt renewed hope that they would be able to repair the relationships within the team. That was Daniel's top priority right now: repairing the damage that had been catalyzed by SG-1's last mission, the physical as well as the emotional.

"I love you, ya know," Daniel admitted just outside the entrance to the store, tugging her gently around so he could look her in the eye.

"I know," Sam replied, tilting her head slightly to smile up at him. "I love you too."

"I know," Daniel mimicked. He was pleased that she hadn't hesitated to respond, despite the fact that his statement was both unusual and, he thought, unexpected. "Let's buy your furniture and get outta here."

With that, he opened the door and followed Sam into the store, their hands still intertwined.


	8. Chapter 8

**Descension Back To Normalcy**

"How did it go?" Janet asked as Sam gracelessly dropped herself into the barely large enough space between Jack and Teal'c.

"I now remember why I swore to never again buy furniture," Sam declared tiredly. She closed her eyes and let her head fall back against the wall behind her with a thump, enjoying the familiar tingle that sang through her blood whenever she was in close proximity to Teal'c. It was a welcome change from the cloying sensation of being stalked by overzealous sales people once they'd realized just how much furniture she needed to buy.

"Tell me there's pizza left," Daniel pleaded as he too slumped to the floor in an exhausted heap.

"Nope," someone replied from near the doorway to the living room. "All gone."

"Is anybody else sick of pizza?" Feretti asked, sounding bored in general. Sam had noticed he really enjoyed ripping what remained of her house to pieces; she couldn't help but wonder if he would disappear when there was nothing left to do to but actually _fix_ things.

"We could order Chinese for dinner?" Sam suggested, fishing in her pocket for her cell phone.

Everyone consented, leaving Graham Simmons with the daunting task of finding out what almost all of the off-duty personnel stationed at the SGC wanted to order. Making his way around the kitchen where everyone had gathered for a break took almost twenty minutes, but no one minded that their break would be longer than originally intended. By the time Sam placed the order the list was two pages long; the employees at the nearest Chinese place didn't know what had hit them.

Sitting around on the floor, everyone enjoyed their well-deserved rest and took turns filling Sam in on what had been accomplished while she was out.

What they accomplished was, in short, quite a bit. The holes in many of the walls had been filled and new drywall had been hung where necessary. The front door had been replaced, complete with new locks and a heavy-duty security chain that Teal'c had informed her she most certainly _would_ be using. Most of the pipes on the main and upper floors no longer leaked, and a plumber would be back tomorrow to repair the pipes in the basement. Once that was taken care of, a contractor was scheduled to drop by and make sure that the water problems hadn't given way to mould issues. Once the basement got the all clear, they would focus their attention down there. In the meantime, they were devoting most of their time and energy to the house's top two floors. After getting a lot of "that's classified"s in answer to his questions about what on earth they had been doing with electricity, an electrician had solved the problems with the power. The sub-floor was repaired in the kitchen and would be repaired elsewhere in the days to come. After that, they could begin laying down new tile and carpeting. Strategically placed sheets of drywall had all the ceilings repaired quickly. The windows on the lower level of the house would be replaced tomorrow, followed by the ones on the upper level the day after. Everyone agreed that they would have the repairs done by the time the furniture was delivered in a week and a half.

When Janet commented on how quickly painting would go in an unfurnished house, the men of SG-1 had all cast assessing glances at Sam. Seeing how she perked up at the thought of painting, Daniel shot a glare at Jack, sure that they really would be painting multi-colour stripes throughout the house. Teal'c settled for raising an eyebrow while Jack treated them both to his best "who me?" expression.

When Sam was up to speed on their progress, the kitchen grew quiet. The ambitious timeline for getting the house liveable again was already beginning to take its toll and those of them who were off-duty again tomorrow would be back bright and early the next morning. They were all more than happy to relax and, in some cases, even catch a quick catnap before the food arrived, knowing that they still had a few more hours of work ahead of them before calling it a night.

"Appliances tomorrow," Jack announced suddenly, interrupting the tired silence that had settled over the room.

"What?" Sam asked sleepily, turning her head to look at him through barely open eyes.

"You need a fridge, a stove, appliances," Jack elaborated. "I'll take you tomorrow."

"You don't have to do that, sir," Sam objected, stifling a yawn.

"Yes I do," Jack replied with a smirk as he stared pointedly across the room. "Sending Daniel again just might kill the poor guy." As Jack had intended, everyone's attention turned from visions of cold beers and their beds to the aforementioned archaeologist.

Daniel was slumped against the wall, fast asleep. His glasses were crooked on his face and his head was tilted back, giving everyone a clear view of the string of drool slowly running down his chin. Laughter was suppressed at the sight and more than one of the women present had to leave the room to dissolve in a fit of giggles out in the backyard. Though amused by the sight, the men settled for smirking at the oblivious archaeologist and quietly marvelling at how _girly _their female co-workers could be sometimes. Decaffeinated as he was after going a whole afternoon without coffee, Daniel slept on, the string of drool growing longer with each passing minute.

After the silence was broken, small conversations broke out as people caught up on current events, sports, one another's families and off-world antics that had "accidentally" been omitted from official reports. The amicable chitchat passed the time until the doorbell eventually rang, signalling the arrival of what was quite possibly the largest delivery order in the history of Colorado Springs.

As the chime from Sam's brand new doorbell died away, Teal'c grabbed his hat off the floor and rose gracefully to his feet. Securing the hat over his tattoo, he went to answer the door much to the relief of everyone else. As uncomfortable as the plywood sub-floor was, their exhaustion made staying put a much more attractive option than moving.

"Major Carter," Teal'c called from the hallway, his voice jolting Daniel awake. "There is a caravan of delivery vehicles assembled outside your home."

"Oh man," Sam moaned as she got tiredly to her feet. "As if the neighbours don't think I'm strange enough after the last two weeks! I need a couple of able-bodied soldiers to help me out."

Hauling himself upright along with six others, Jack trudged to the door behind Sam and saw that there were indeed twelve delivery cars all bearing the same logo parked along the street, fitted in where they could find room amongst all the cars belonging to the neighbours and the SGC personnel.

Teal'c gladly stepped aside and let Sam deal with the stressed out delivery people. Putting on her most apologetic smile, she paid the five hundred plus dollar bill. She then moved out of the way with an armful of bags filled with little white containers and went back to the kitchen, leaving the rest of the food to Teal'c and her able-bodied volunteers. Settling back in her spot, Sam opened the containers and, with the help of Graham Simmons' handy dandy list, began figuring out who was supposed to get what.


	9. Chapter 9

**Descension Back To Normalcy**

Thanking the last half dozen people out the door for all their help, Sam let the heavy slab of wood swing shut and the smile drop from her face. It had been a long day – a long week, really – and she was completely and utterly exhausted. She'd been ready to call it a night hours ago, but the others had been determined to keep going and so here they were, wrapping up just a bit after midnight.

As hard as today had been physically, Sam had found it even more taxing emotionally. She'd spent a few hours sorting through the items that had been placed under tarps in the backyard and had been confronted with just how complete the NID's destruction of her home had been. The few childhood treasures she'd managed to hang on to throughout all the moves she'd made growing up had been wrecked: the quilt her mother had painstakingly sewn for her as a baby had been sliced into several pieces and trampled on, staining it with the impressions of many pairs of muddy combat boots; the cover had been torn off the favourite story book she'd clamoured into her father's lap with on many occasions and many of the pages had been ripped out and scattered across the floor; and countless framed photos had been carelessly tossed to the ground and left lying in puddles, to name just a few. Despite the damage, Sam was determined to keep the mementos, boxing them up and storing them in Jack's truck.

Her teammates had kept a careful eye on her while she'd been in the backyard sorting, constantly coming out to check up on her. She'd appreciated their concern, but all she'd wanted was to be left alone; she didn't want anyone seeing her cry over the smashed trophy from the last swim meet her mother had ever attended or the soggy card with running ink that Mark had sent her the day she received her PhD, even though they hadn't spoken to one another for over two years at that point. Despite her wishes, her teammates had made periodic trips to the backyard and did their best to keep the rest of the SGC personnel away, respecting her privacy even when they insisted on violating it themselves.

Feeling a pair of arms snake around her waist, Sam leaned back gratefully and accepted the gesture of comfort. They may drive her crazy with their hovering, but, even after everything that had happened in the last few weeks, she knew she wouldn't trade her teammates for anything in the world, the galaxy or even the multiverse.

"Before we get back to Jack and Teal'c, you're not staying here tonight. There's no point in having that argument again," Daniel breathed in her ear, keeping his voice down so Teal'c wouldn't be able to make out the words with his superhuman hearing. "So the only real question is: do you feel like being subjected to Jack O'Neill mother-henning or Daniel Jackson mother-henning tonight?"

"I appreciate it, Daniel, but I should probably go with the Colonel," Sam thanked with a small smile, turning her head to the side so she could hear his heartbeat thudding rhythmically under her ear. "You and I can do this," she explained, tilting her head towards his arms around her waist, "Anytime we want. Colonel O'Neill and I can't, so he feels like he can't do _anything_ to make me feel better."

"Humour Jack by letting him think he's helping," Daniel summed up with an appreciative grin. "Samantha Carter, you are _very_ manipulative when you want to be!"

"I know," Sam said, pulling away reluctantly. "Let's go back to the hen house."

"Lead on," Daniel offered with a sweeping gesture towards the kitchen door.

"Kids," Jack's voice called out as if on cue, "Just about ready to go?"

"Yes, sir," Sam replied with a pointed look and an eye roll. "We're ready to go now."

"Okey dokey," he bounded into the front hall with three jackets in his hands and Teal'c trailing behind him, contemplating the wisdom of asking about the meaning of 'okey dokey'.

"Uh Carter," Jack began, handing Daniel the proper jacket, "Not that I mind you borrowing my clothes since I've shrunk so many of them while trying and failing to do my own laundry, but you should probably go shopping soon," he continued, giving her an old jacket that was too small for him but still way too big for her.

"Afraid of what people will think if they see me running around town in your clothes, sir?" Sam asked mischievously as she slid the proffered jacket on and rolled the sleeves up several times in order to free her hands.

"Only the people with lots of shiny stuff on their dress blues," Jack clarified over his shoulder as he moved to wait outside, shrugging his own jacket on as he went.

"He is in a very good mood," Teal'c stated quietly as he squeezed past Sam and Daniel, hat already on his head. "It is beginning to frighten me." With that he followed Jack outside, leaving the other two to hide their smiles as they trailed after him.

Locking the door was more a formality than a necessity since anyone who wanted in badly enough could simply climb in the glass-less windows, but Sam did it anyway. Saying quick goodnights to Sam and Jack, Daniel and Teal'c hurried off to the archaeologist's car. He would give Teal'c a ride back to the base and then go home and keep an ear open for the phone call signalling that Jack was driving Sam crazy and she needed to get away from his well-intentioned yet frustrating smothering.

Meanwhile, Jack and Sam headed to Jack's truck and cranked the heat up for the drive back to his house. Once there, Sam had no doubt that it would take every last ounce of patience she could muster to keep her temper from flaring over the inevitable hovering that would plague her.

"You know," Jack began as he pulled away from the curb and waved to Daniel and Teal'c. "You should go shopping with Cassie. You always say you never get to see her enough and Frasier says she's addicted to the mall. It'd be perfect."

"That's a good idea," Sam admitted. "But I was just planning on raiding your wardrobe tonight," she finished with an evil grin. "I'd be set for life!"

"Put on half of my stuff and we'd have to call the coast guard in to find you," Jack retorted with a chuckle, sparing her a quick glance before his eyes returned to the road. "You're swimming in the clothes that are too small for me, imagine how big clothes that actually _fit_ me would be on you."

"Do we even _have_ a coast guard in Colorado?" Sam asked seriously.

"You'd better hope so, if you're planning on raiding my closet tonight," Jack teased, knowing that the lack of a proper answer would slowly drive her crazy.

They lapsed into silence after that and Jack resisted the urge to turn on the radio to fill the silence. He could tell she was lost in thought and the constant glances over her shoulder to check that the box in the truck bed was still there gave him a pretty good idea of what she was thinking about. Jack knew he hadn't been responsible for the destruction of her belongings, but he still felt guilty for it. So much of the damage had been unnecessary - like destroying old family photo albums - that he couldn't help but feel that Simmons had sanctioned it simply to warn him about the consequences of crossing the NID. If that had in fact been the intention, then Jack had gotten the message, loud and clear. Unfortunately for Simmons, it had pissed Jack off more than it had intimidated him.

Knowing that there were no words that could make her feel better, Jack left Sam to her thoughts. Occasionally he managed to catch her eye when she looked back and forth between the road ahead and the truck bed, but she was doing her best to avoid meeting his gaze. The comfortable quiet slowly transformed itself into awkward silence and Jack was glad when they finally reached his house.

Climbing out of the truck, he tossed her his house keys and waved off her offer to bring in the one box of belongings that she'd managed to salvage so far. Hefting its light weight easily, he followed her into the house and set the box on the floor in the living room. Given that the box's contents could serve as mementos of either happy or sad times, he'd leave it up to her to decide whether or not she wanted it in "her" room tonight.

"Do you want anything?" Jack asked, retracing his steps to the front door and locking it for the night.

"No thanks, sir," Sam murmured distractedly, her gaze focussed on the box. "I'm tired; I think I'll just head to bed."

"Okay," he replied, before adding, "You can take that with you, if you want."

"I know," she muttered, warring with herself. A part of her demanded that she not let the box out of her sight, lest something happen to what little she'd managed to salvage, but another part didn't want to spend the night with the stark reminder of what he NID had done after being immersed in the aftermath all day long. Finally making up her mind, she bent down and gathered the box in her arms.

"Help yourself to anything you need," Jack reminded, flicking on a table lamp in case she made a trip to the kitchen during the night. "And if you need to talk…"

"I know where to find you," she assured, a hint of a smile creeping across her face. "Good night, sir."

"Night, Carter," he replied, watching her make her way down the hall and shut the bedroom door firmly.

Jack stopped in the kitchen for a glass of water before heading to bed himself. Making his way down the hallway, he paused for a moment outside Sam's room. He could hear her sniffling quietly through the door and debated whether her should leave her alone or poke his head in and see if she wanted to talk. He made up his mind a heartbeat later; she'd been holding back tears for the last few hours, clearly waiting until she was alone before letting them fall. For now, he'd respect her privacy and let her have some time alone. Reluctantly, he forced his feet to move again and entered his own room, shutting the door behind him.

**A/N: **Don't hate me! Jack is _not_ a big jerk, I promise. The next chapter should be out tomorrow and then you can all see for yourselves: )


	10. Chapter 10

**A/N:** This idea popped into my head yesterday morning when my alarm went off to Ryan Adams' "When The Stars Go Blue". I ended up scrapping what I'd already written and starting this part from scratch. I am absolutely in love with this version of the chapter, and now that I've written it, I have a few other ideas for chapters I'd like to write. They don't change the end of the story, they just add more meat to it… Which means that the next few updates might take a while. Oops. Still, I will try to update every two or three days, so hopefully you won't have to wait too long to find out what happens next! And now on with the next chapter. Enjoy!

**Descension Back To Normalcy**

Jack lay in bed staring at the ceiling and listening to the muffled sobs from the other side of the wall for the second night in a row. He'd allowed Sam to have last night to herself. At that point, he'd been reluctant to disturb her, confident that he'd caused at least a few of the tears he'd laid in bed listening to. On top of that, there had still been too much he didn't know about what had happened between her and Orlin to feel comfortable talking to her about it. A few subtle phone calls to General Hammond throughout the day combined with the talk SG-1 had had last night left him with a better understanding of the situation and feeling ready to deal with her tears tonight.

Checking his watch again, he saw that only fifteen minutes had passed and heaved a heavy sigh. He'd promised himself that he'd give Sam twenty minutes to herself before checking on her. At the time, it had seemed reasonable but as the minutes had ticked slowly by, he was sorely tempted to forget his self-imposed time limit and go to her right away.

As he watched the sixteenth minute of his wait crawl into existence, the sobs faded away. In their place came the faint creaking of the floorboards, signalling that Sam was up and moving about. Moments later he heard the door to "her" room open and soft footfalls heading down the stairs and towards the living room. Lying still and straining his ears, he could just make out the soft click of a door unlocking in the distance and, a few seconds later, the muffled thud of a door being eased shut. With a soft smile, Jack sat up and moved to his closet, rifling about for the thickest sweatshirt he could find.

Pulling the well-worn grey material over his head, he meandered out to the front hall and slipped a pair of beat up running shoes on his feet. Stalling for time in order to allow Sam a few more moments alone, he took the time to tie the laces before heading to the back door, pausing only to grab two thick fleece blankets. Like the woman he was shadowing, he eased the door shut as quietly as possible and crossed the wooden deck almost on tiptoe, keeping his steps as silent as he could. When he reached the base of the ladder leaning against the side of the house, he draped the blankets over his arm and forced his protesting knees to make the short climb.

Reaching the top, he found Sam leaning against the wooden railing a few feet from his telescope, her eyes raking over the blanket of stars overhead. When she failed to react to his sudden appearance, he knew she was lost in her thoughts again. He took advantage of the opportunity to really study Sam without Major Carter getting in the way and wasn't surprised to find the odd tear still rolling down her cheek every now and again.

Quietly approaching, he draped a blanket around her shoulders and informed her, "The blankets are piled by the door, for future reference."

She jumped in surprise and blinked rapidly, trying to clear the remaining tears from her eyes. Considering he could still make out the streaks they left behind on her face, it was a wasted effort, but he had to give her credit for trying.

"Sorry, sir," Sam apologized, swallowing convulsively to try and clear her throat. "I didn't mean to wake you."

"You didn't," he assured, wrapping the second blanket around himself. "How are you doing? And don't try to tell me you're fine," he added, knowing that the lie was on the tip of her tongue.

"It's hard," she confessed, returning her attention back to the sky. "I'm trying to cope with everything, but it's all a little overwhelming."

"Do you want to talk about it?" he offered, watching to see if her body language matched her answer.

"Do you?" she fired back, her voice laced with doubt.

"Carter, I'll do whatever I need to in order to help you get through this. Just say the word."

Jack saw resignation flash across her features, though he wasn't sure what it meant. She had either resigned herself to opening up to him or to having to kick her commanding officer off his own roof. Jack preferred the first option but he was more or less okay with the second, just so long as "kicking him off the roof" was a figure of speech.

"I know it's just stuff," Sam sighed, her fingers tracing idle patterns on the wooden railing in front of her. "But some of it… I don't know, some of it's _not_ just stuff, not to me. It's my past and memories and family heirlooms. It's bad enough that the NID picked through all of it for the sole purpose of destroying it, but then to have a group from the SGC rifle through it afterwards and sort it into piles of 'garbage' and 'probably garbage'… I know they were trying to help, but it still feels like an invasion of privacy."

"You're a private person, Carter. Of course it felt like an invasion of privacy, regardless of the intention behind it," Jack noted understandingly, stepping back from the railing and settling himself in his private observatory's lone chair.

"Still, they were all there trying to help and the whole time I was in the backyard, I just kept wishing that they would go away," she confessed, guilt evident in her voice.

"I think any one of us would have felt the same way," Jack reasoned. "You have nothing to feel bad about."

"Maybe," she said, her tone non-committal.

Jack knew that she had more to say and waited patiently, giving her the time and the quiet she needed to sort out her thoughts. Even without being able to see her face, he could tell when she'd decided on her next words, the subtle change in her posture warning him that she was uncomfortable with what she was about to say.

"I'm still struggling with the fact that you guys didn't believe me," Sam murmured. "I mean, you and Daniel and Teal'c are my best friends, and I can't imagine trying to cope with everything that's happened without you, but at the same time, I can't forget your roles in this whole mess. I don't blame you," she added hurriedly, finally turning to meet his eyes. "But I can't stop running through things in my head and wondering how everything would have turned out if the SGC had believed me and kept the NID out of it."

"I've been doing the same thing," Jack confessed. "And so have Daniel and Teal'c and General Hammond probably has been too. We messed up and even if you don't blame us, we blame ourselves."

"I wish I could stop thinking about it," she said quietly. "I just want to be able to trust you all without reservations again, like I did before."

"You still trust us more than you think you do," he pointed out. At her questioning look, he explained, "When you got back from Velona, you let Teal'c handcuff you and cart you off to a holding cell to appease Simmons while he was on the phone with the President. You spent a good chunk of last night curled up around Daniel and then went out and spent the whole afternoon alone with him. Tonight you're _supposed_ to be sleeping down the hall from me, just the two of us in the house."

"So?"

"Would you really have done that – any of that – if you didn't trust us?"

She hesitated for a few moments to think this over before breathing a quiet "no."

"We'll be okay," Jack assured. "We got through my undercover stint with the rogue NID team two years ago and we're going to get through this too. All of us."

"How can you be so sure?" she asked, wishing she could share his confidence.

"Because we're family," he stated quietly, reaching out and snagging her sleeve. He pulled her towards him and gave her arm a gentle downward tug, urging her to sit on the edge of his chair. "Families stick together, even when it isn't easy."

Following his unspoken command, Sam lowered herself onto the chair and leaned back, resting her back against his chest. She felt him shift behind her and smiled when his arms and the soft fleece wrapped lightly around her waist, the combined warmth of his body and the second blanket chasing away the slight chill in the night air.

"Back in General Hammond's office, I lied," Sam whispered, closing her eyes.

"If you tell me what you lied about, am I going to be obligated to report you?" Jack teased lightly, knowing that nothing she had to say could be _that _bad. Even under the worst circumstances imaginable, he knew she wouldn't have looked the General in the eye and outright lied to him.

"You heard Simmons ranting about my 'intimate' relationship with Orlin?"

"Hard not to," Jack replied with a grimace. He wasn't sure he was comfortable with where this conversation was heading, but he was still willing to listen for her sake.

"Well, it was an intimate relationship, I suppose, but not the way Simmons meant," she explained, tucking her head under his chin. "Orlin's people have the ability to establish… a connection with one another. It's not psychic; they can literally share their souls with one another."

"And he did that with you," Jack guessed, filling in the blanks.

"He tried doing it back on Velona but I wasn't open to it; that's why I passed out."

"Were you okay the second time he tried?"

"Once he warned me what he was going to do and I had the chance to prepare myself for it," Sam assured.

"It's no wonder he fell in love with you," Jack murmured, glad that the alien mind-soul-whatever meld hadn't harmed her.

"Sir…" she started, sounding disappointed that he wasn't going to be serious about this conversation any longer.

"No, I mean it," he interrupted. "Infatuation is nothing new; men are forever taking one look at you and then spending the rest of our missions mooning over you. But Orlin wasn't infatuated, he was in love and I don't blame him. He realized you're as beautiful on the outside as you are on the inside. Unlike _some_ of us, he got to cheat and fast-track his way to that realization," he added lightly, trying to bring levity to the moment. Neither one of them did well when it came to talking about feelings and he was afraid he might be making her uncomfortable.

"It was incredible, knowing someone so well even though I'd only known them for a short time," she sighed, fisting the blanket between her cool fingers.

"He's not the only one who knows you inside out and backwards, you know," Jack pointed out, tilting his head so his cheek was pressed into her hair.

"And here I was thinking it was all your black ops training that led you out here after me," Sam teased, shifting slightly so she could look at the night sky.

"We _are_ going to be okay, Carter," he promised, settling back and pulling her tighter against him.

"That gets a little easier to believe every time you say it," she smiled. Jack was right: trusting her teammates was as natural to her as breathing and she often did it without realizing it. The more she thought about the last two days, the more she could pick out little moments that she'd thought nothing of at the time but, upon closer examination, demonstrated that even now she trusted them to no end.

"We should get to bed soon, it's going to be another long day tomorrow," Jack observed, even as he relaxed further back into the chair.

"Not yet," she sighed, enjoying the opportunity to simply sit and study the familiar star patterns of Earth. "It's a beautiful night."

"That it is," he agreed, a smile teasing the corners of his mouth upwards.

"Tell me about them," she requested.

"You already know this stuff," he argued. Sure, astronomy was his hobby, but she'd made the stars her whole life.

"I know the science," she rebutted. "You know the stories behind them."

"Okay," he acquiesced, searching the sky for a good place to begin. Finally making his mind up, he raised a finger and directed her attention to the first constellation. "See that one? That's Cassiopeia, 'Cass' for short. It's named, not for our dear adopted niece Cassandra Frasier, but, of course, for… Cassius Clay, the great boxer."

She giggled at that, the soft sounds bringing a full smile to his face. With that informative introduction, Jack proceeded to "educate" Sam about the various constellations visible from Earth. As she snuggled into his warmth and slowly relaxed, Sam finally allowed herself to believe that maybe SG-1 would be all right after all.

**A/N:** And this is what happens when you wake up to Ryan Adams: )


	11. Chapter 11

**Descension Back To Normalcy**

"Did the NID trash my car when I wasn't looking?" Sam asked suspiciously, crossing her arms and narrowing her eyes.

"No," Daniel replied slowly, frozen with his arms halfway into the sleeves of his jacket.

"Do any of you have orders from General Hammond or Janet that I don't know about?" she pressed, her eyes darting back and forth between her three teammates.

"No," Jack assured, his fingers curled around his keys and one foot already jammed in his shoe.

"Is my sanity still in question?" she persisted. In spite of herself, she felt her heart speed up as she realized that they might be acting under MacKenzie's orders.

"No," Teal'c took his turn to answer firmly, planting a tri-colour beanie on his head to cover his tattoo.

"Then let me drive myself, for crying out loud!" she cried, throwing her arms out in exasperation. A moment later, she realized what she'd said and narrowed her eyes again, sweeping her glare over the three of them. "Don't even start."

"I wouldn't dream of it," Jack smirked, pleased that he was rubbing off on her even though she didn't seem to be.

"We want to see Cassie too," Daniel argued defensively, pouting slightly and turning his best puppy dog eyes on Sam in the hopes of changing her mind.

"_Girls'_ day, Daniel," Sam reminded, quirking her eyebrow. "Unless there's something you'd like to share with the rest of us, I don't think you're eligible to participate."

"We are merely attempting to…" Teal'c began, trying to explain their persistent efforts to keep her from driving herself anywhere.

"Smother me? It's working," Sam snapped. She shrugged on her jacket and held out her hand expectantly. "Hand them over," she demanded.

"What?" Jack asked at the same time Daniel asked "Who?" They turned to one another with raised eyebrows before turning to blink at Sam in confusion.

"Keys. Now. I don't care whose they are," she elaborated, tapping her foot impatiently.

"I suppose this means you'd like one of us to run you up to the base later and pick up your car?" Jack asked sarcastically, pocketing his keys again. There was absolutely _no way_ he was letting her drive his truck when she was in such a foul mood.

"Whatever gave you that idea, sir?" she asked sweetly, snatching Daniel's keys from his hand and turning on her heel.

"Um, maybe the fact that you've been asking for the last three days?" Jack retorted. The only response he got was a screen door banging shut and a vague wave over the shoulder.

"Have a good time and give Cass our love," Daniel called to Sam's retreating back. He too got nothing more than a distracted wave in reply.

"I informed you on several occasions that she would quickly lose patience with depending on others for transportation, O'Neill," Teal'c observed, watching as Sam slammed the door to Daniel's car shut with much more force than was really necessary.

Daniel winced in sympathy for the hinges on his car's poor door.

"Yes, you did," Jack sighed, watching as she backed out of the driveway faster than was probably safe and peeled off, revving the engine repeatedly.

Daniel winced again, wracking his brain as he tried to remember the last time he'd had his brake pads replaced.

Inside the car, Sam sighed and took several deep breaths to calm herself down. Glancing at the speedometer, she realized she was driving _way_ over the speed limit and eased her foot off the gas pedal. Letting one hand wander to her hip, Sam unclipped her cell phone from the waistband of her jeans and hesitated for a few seconds before flipping it open. She'd over-reacted to the situation – she knew that – and rather than letting the minor spat fester for the rest of the day, she sent a quick text message to her teammates. It only took a few swipes of her thumb across the keypad to enter the simple "sorry" and then she flipped the phone shut again and tossed it on the seat next to her.

She needn't have bothered. A few seconds later, her phone let out three short beeps announcing that she'd received new text messages. Groping on the seat for the phone, she flipped it open and scrolled quickly through "forget it," "me too," and "as am I" with a smile. Turning her full attention back to the road, Sam made the short drive to the Frasier house. This was the longest stretch of time she'd had truly to herself in days, so she kept the radio off and just enjoyed the peace and quiet of the empty car.

She appreciated how many people had gone out of their way to help her out in the last few days, but all that kindness had made it virtually impossible for Sam to find two consecutive minutes to herself. Her house was still swarming with SGC personnel at all hours, the round-the-clock efforts ensuring huge leaps towards making her house livable again. Well that was certainly good news, it also meant that no matter where she went in her house, she couldn't turn around without running into someone with a job to do in the room. She adored them all for their efforts, but it still felt very overwhelming.

Time to herself had also been hard to come across at night. She was still staying in Jack's spare bedroom and Daniel and Teal'c had moved into his living room until further notice. When she'd asked, they'd explained that it was easier for them all to carpool back and forth to Sam's house from a central location than to keep shuttling Teal'c and Daniel from her house to the mountain and Daniel's apartment. However, she suspected that it was really a poorly disguised effort at repairing the relationships between the team by forcing them together, just as they'd done in the early days of SG-1. Once again, she appreciated the lengths they were going to, but sometimes she felt like she needed breathing space more than she needed their boundless support and never-ending series of sweet gestures.

Turning the final corner and steering the car onto the Frasier's street, Sam looked ahead and scanned the appropriate house. She saw the curtains in the living room window twitch and broke out in a grin when a copper-haired whirlwind flew out the front door and raced down the driveway to meet the car. Sam shifted the car into park and got out, closing the door just in time to catch an armful of excited teenage girl.

"I'm _so _glad you're here!" Cassandra squealed, squeezing her adopted aunt around the waist. "But I thought it was supposed to be just us…" she noted, trying to peer into the car's windows.

"Daniel's spending the day at my place with the Colonel and Teal'c, I just borrowed his car," Sam explained, running her fingers through the teenager's hair. "I did have to remind him that he doesn't meet the necessary criteria to participate in girls' day, though," she added, making Cassandra giggle.

"Goodbye to you too," Janet called to her daughter, stepping out onto the front porch in bare feet. "Hey, Sam, how's it going?"

"Things are good," Sam assured, finally releasing Cassandra from the hug. "The guys are hovering but they mean well."

"They do," Janet agreed, sharing a knowing smile Sam. The subtext of what her best friend _wasn't_ saying was clear: her teammates were slowly driving Sam crazy and despite her best efforts, she was starting to get frustrated with them. "I see you managed to get away from them though."

"Believe me, _that_ took some doing," Sam stated, rolling her eyes.

"They care," Janet reminded as Cassandra sighed dramatically and walked around to the passenger side of the car pointedly.

"Saaaam…" the teenager almost whined, shifting from foot to foot with impatience.

"Okay, okay, we're going," Sam laughed, opening the car door. "Are you sure you don't want to come?" she called to Janet as Cassandra just about threw herself into the car.

"Hmm… Another weekend at the mall with an excitable teenage girl?" Janet pretended to consider it carefully, tapping her chin in thought. "I think I'll pass."

"We'll be back by dinner time," Sam promised, sharing a knowing grin with the other woman.

"Pizza and Margarita Monday when you get back?"

"Replace "pizza" with "Thai" and I'm there," Sam negotiated. Living with three men, even temporarily, meant she was eating a steady diet of pizza, beer and more pizza. He'd pulled out all the stops when trying to explain it to her, but Jack still hadn't convinced her that switching up toppings kept one from getting sick of eating pizza.

"Done," Janet agreed. "When do you need to have Daniel's car back?"

"Daniel can have his car back when I get _my_ car back," Sam stated, her tone making it clear that this was _not_ open to debate.

"They care," Janet reminded, sensing her friend's frustration.

"They care," Sam agreed, stepping one foot into the car.

Anything else Sam might have said was cut off by a long honk of the horn. The two women turned their attention to the teenager waiting impatiently in the car, her most innocent expression plastered on her face.

"You'd better go before she decides to drive," Janet stated wryly. Realizing that Cassandra would, in fact, be learning to drive in just a few months, Janet suppressed a shudder. With an adopted aunt and two adopted uncles who lived to fly as fast as humanly possible, plus a few years of zipping around Colorado Springs on classic motorcycles, tucked safely behind said adopted aunt under Cassandra's belt, Janet fully expected that teaching her to drive would be a harrowing experience.

"See you tonight," Sam bid Janet farewell, climbing back into the car, much to Cassandra's relief.

Backing the car out of the driveway one-handed, Sam fastened her seatbelt with the other before waving goodbye to Janet. Cassandra offered a distracted wave as she launched into a detailed story about the latest saga in the life of a high school student. Janet watched from the porch as Sam, bless her heart, took it in stride and began nodding in what Janet assumed to be all the appropriate places. After watching the car disappear around the corner, Janet made her way back inside to inventory supplies for Margarita Monday.


	12. Chapter 12

**A/N: **Sorry for the wait – real life sucks sometimes. : P Here's the next chapter, and hopefully I'll get another one or two written this weekend (fingers crossed!). Thank you to everyone who has been reading (and reviewing!). I hope you all enjoy the next chapter!

**Descension Back To Normalcy**

Tossing her armload of bags into the back seat, Cassandra grabbed her sundae off the roof of the car, hip-checked the door shut and moved around to the front of the car where Sam already sat. The teenager ran a hand quickly over the back pockets of her jeans and, not encountering any metal studding on the soft denim, took a seat next to Sam on the hood of the car.

"Janet doesn't need to know about the ice cream," Sam instructed, tilting her head back and letting the late summer sunshine warm her face. "And Daniel doesn't need to know we used his car as a bench."

"My lips are sealed," Cassandra promised, spooning a heaping pile of hot fudge coated ice cream into her mouth. Closing her eyes, she savoured the contrast between the warm topping and the cold ice cream, letting it melt completely away before swallowing. "Yours is going to melt," she advised, loading her spoon up with another mouthful.

"I don't really want it," Sam said dismissively, lying back on the warm metal and planting her feet firmly on the ground to keep her from sliding off the sloped hood.

"But it's your favourite," the teenager wheedled, nudging the abandoned plastic bowl towards her adopted aunt.

"I'm going to be in just as much trouble with your mom for spoiling _my_ _own_ appetite as I would be for spoiling yours," Sam pointed out but obligingly ate a spoonful of her banana split anyway.

"That banana is probably the first fruit or vegetable you've eaten in days that didn't come on top of a pizza," Cassandra retorted between spoonfuls of ice cream. "I think she'd approve."

"Actually, I think she'd be disgusted to learn just how much pizza the men of SG-1 subsist on during downtime, but let's not dwell," Sam noted, breaking off another piece of banana and swirling it through a pile of whipped cream before popping it in her mouth.

Cassandra stirred her treat around inside the little plastic bowl, using the spoon to mix the hot fudge in with more of her ice cream while she observed the woman sitting next to her. The pair had spent most of the afternoon goofing around, catching up and, of course, doing more shopping in just a few hours than Cassandra could remember doing cumulatively in any given six month period, but now that they were quietly enjoying one another's company, Cassandra couldn't help but notice the change in Sam's demeanor. Gone were the beaming smiles and easy laughter; in their place Cassandra could find only tense muscles and clear blue eyes that had lost their sparkle.

"Are you okay?" Cassandra asked quietly, scrutinizing Sam closely and setting the remains of her sundae behind her.

"I'm fine," Sam replied flatly, the words so devoid of inflection and emotion that it was obvious they were more of an automatic response to the question than a real reflection of her well being.

"You seem sad," Cassandra pressed. "I mean, I get why you would be, but…"

"I appreciate your concern, sweetheart," Sam interrupted, a hint of a genuine smile crossing her face. "But really, I'm okay. There's just a lot going on right now, and it's been a bit tough finding time to stop and absorb everything, so when I get two minutes to sit and think, sometimes I get lost in my thoughts, that's all."

"Oh," the teenager said thoughtfully. She knew the basics of what had happened in the last few weeks, having pestered information out of her mom and overheard random snippets of phone conversations now and again, and she couldn't blame Sam for getting distracted trying to process recent events. "I'm sorry I dragged you all over town today. You'd probably rather have had some time to yourself..."

"No," Sam said firmly, wrapping her fingers around Cassandra's hand and squeezing tightly. "I'm glad I had the chance to spend the day with you; it's _exactly_ what I needed."

"Really?"

"Absolutely," Sam assured, sitting up and slipping an arm around Cassandra's shoulders. "Don't _ever_ think there's something I'd rather be doing than spending time with you, Cass; it's just not true."

"Okay," the teenager agreed, dropping her head to Sam's shoulder and closing her eyes while nimble fingers stroked soothingly through her hair.

"Are you ready to call it a day?" Sam asked, curling a long lock of copper-coloured hair around her index finger.

"Yeah, I'm done," Cassandra said, turning her head and burying her face in Sam's shoulder. "As long as you're still having dinner with us tonight. I don't want you to go back to Jack's yet."

"Believe me, neither do I," Sam replied, but Cassandra noticed that the humour that would usually accompany such a comment was missing.

"I know the others didn't believe you about, you know," Cassandra murmured quietly, cautious of what she said since they were still sitting in a very public parking lot. "That must have hurt a lot."

"It did," Sam sighed, the words escaping in a rush of air. "But we're over that."

"All of you?"

"All of us."

"Because it really doesn't seem like _you_ are," Cassandra observed. "You say all the right things, but sometimes when I bring one of them up, your eyes change and it seems kind of like you're just _pretending_ to be okay."

Sam sighed again, not really able to argue with the teenager. She was well past forgiving her teammates for not believing her, but a surge of hurt still accompanied thoughts of them sometimes. As she'd said a few nights ago during the team heart-to-heart, she had forgiveness covered, it was forgetting that was proving to be a challenge.

"It still hurts to remember that they didn't trust me," Sam decided to confess, wondering when Cassandra had gotten to be so perceptive. "But we've all talked about it and we _are _okay. It's just going to take a little time for all of us to move past this."

"It's not going to break you guys up?" Cassandra asked uncertainly, finally giving voice to the thought that had been nagging away at her for days.

"Absolutely not," Sam swore, her voice laced with conviction. In spite of the damaged trust and hurt feelings, the last few days had proven once and for all that her team was her family and, as Jack had noted a few nights ago, families stuck together even when doing so was difficult.

Besides, Sam knew she wouldn't be able to get rid of her teammates if she tried.

"Good," Cassandra stated, sliding her arm around Sam's waist and squeezing tightly.

It might be a bit ridiculous now, knowing the members of SG-1 as she did, but a large part of Cassandra would always hero-worship the four people who'd plucked her from her decimated world and woven her into their lives. Years of careful observation had taught her that there was something special about Sam, Jack, Daniel and Teal'c together, allowing them to beat the odds time and again and return to Earth, sometimes a little worse for the wear but always alive. The thought that they might one day go their separate ways, forsaking that intangible _something_ and paying for it with their lives, terrified her. She'd already lost so much in her short life; the thought of losing one of the people she considered family was unbearable.

"Will you stay the night with me and mom?" Cassandra requested hopefully. "We can pick up dinner and movies on the way home and then spend the rest of the night hanging out together, just the three of us."

"We'll have to call Janet and make sure it's okay with her first," Sam noted, tugging affectionately at the lock of hair wound around her finger.

"You don't _seriously_ think she'll say no, do you?" Cassandra asked in astonishment. Girls' nights at the Frasier house were a regular occurrence and were often arranged on the spur-of-the-moment. She couldn't recall a time when her mother had forbidden it. Heck, half the time it was her mom's idea anyway!

"I think when she sees all the bags in the backseat, she might not want to give me any more opportunities to spoil you rotten for a very, very long time," Sam retorted with a grin.

"Hey! Some of those bags are yours!" the teenager exclaimed, straightening up as she defended herself.

"Yeah, but probably not as many as Janet would like," Sam rebutted knowingly, bracing her hands on the hood beneath her and pushing herself to her feet. Gathering up their garbage, Sam carried it a few feet to the nearest garbage can and disposed of it.

Cassandra lifted her feet off the ground and slid down the sloped metal until she could stand, raising her arms over her head and arching her back as she stretched. When she'd worked out the kinks she'd earned by carting an armload of bags through the mall all afternoon, she slipped her cell phone off the waistband of her jeans, Flipping it open, she speed dialed the house as she climbed into the car. Sam slipped in on the driver's side before slipping the key in the ignition.

As Cassandra updated her mom about the proposed change of plans for the night, Sam gave the teenager a mischievous grin and pulled out of the parking space, revving the engine several times. It would have made Daniel cringe, but he wasn't around. Instead, Cassandra was treated to a lecture from her mother about how Sam was a highly trained pilot and experienced driver with a thorough understanding of the mechanics and capabilities of the car, and that if she ever caught Cassandra driving like that, there would be hell to pay, young lady. Well acquainted with this particular spiel, Cassandra held the phone away from her ear and stuck her tongue out at Sam, giggling when the gesture was returned.

Janet's lecture lasted several minutes and the phone call wrapped up a few minutes after that. In the end, Janet agreed to let Sam stay the night, even if she was a bad influence on her only daughter, and after gleefully passing that tidbit along to Sam, Cassandra hung up, pleased that she had a full night with two of her favourite people to look forward to.


	13. Chapter 13

**A/N: **Here's my second chapter of the weekend! Yay! 

**Descension Back To Normalcy**

"Uh, sweetie," Janet paused in the front hall, watching her daughter struggle through the doorway loaded down with more shopping bags than she could count. "Don't you think it would be easier to leave Sam's bags in the car, rather than hauling them all in tonight and taking them back out tomorrow morning?"

"Sam's bags _are_ in the car," Cassandra huffed, disappearing into the living room and thudding upstairs to her bedroom. 

"Oh they _are, _are they?" Janet asked, quirking her eyebrow and fixing Sam with a pointed look.

"Don't look at me like that," Sam stated firmly, stepping inside with dinner in one hand a bag of movies in the other. 

"Might you have gone just a little overboard?" Janet asked, crossing her arms over her chest.

"If I'd let the guys come along like they wanted to, she would have come home with ten times as much stuff," Sam pointed out, kicking her shoes off and making her way into the kitchen to set her bags down.

"You people spoil her so ridiculously much," Janet said, rolling her eyes and following her friend into the kitchen. "Just because you're not the worst offender doesn't mean you're not bad."

'You love us," Sam reminded, tossing a grin over her shoulder as she set about unpacking the food. "Did you get the stuff for…"

"I set the blender up in the living room," Janet cut her off, opening a cupboard and a drawer simultaneously, pulling out three plates and a handful of spoons for serving the food up. "It made the most sense."

A series of thuds indicated that Cassandra was on the move again. The banging moved over their heads before changing, sounding more like jumps as the teenager mad her way down the stairs.

"Dare I ask how much junk she had?" Janet asked as her daughter literally bounced back into the room.

"I'm pretty confident that you're happier not knowing," Sam assured, handing the other two plates and starting to load up her own. It smelled delicious, especially after living off pizza for the last few days.

"You know, I _am_ standing right here," Cassandra reminded, twirling a chopstick around her fingers while she waited for Sam to finish with the Pad Thai. "Besides, it wasn't _that _bad, mom. We had fruit."

Janet raised an eyebrow skeptically as she started filling her own plate. Looking back and forth between her daughter and her best friend confirmed that she was only getting part of the story. The wide-eyed innocent looks she was getting were a dead giveaway that they weren't being totally honest with her. Rearranging her facial expression to one she usually reserved for her most difficult patients, Janet fixed her gaze on the pair.

"Okay, fine. Sam had fruit," Cassandra amended a few heartbeats after her mother unleashed The Look on her.

"Banana split," Janet guessed, pointing a chopstick at Cassandra. "Which means you had a hot fudge sundae."

"Busted," Sam confessed, sharing a grin with Cassandra. 

"Why is it that whenever you two get together, I end up feeling like a mother of two?" Janet asked rhetorically, shaking her head in amusement. Abandoning the giggling pair, she snagged the bag of movies off the counter and carried it and her plate into the living room.

Settling herself on the left side of the couch, Janet balanced her plate on her lap and dumped the movies on the coffee table. Scanning the titles, she couldn't help but smile. _Ocean's Eleven_, _Solaris _and _Meet Joe Black_. She wasn't surprised that George Clooney and Brad Pitt were invited to girls' night, and neither did the sci-fi or girly movies; the selections were par for the course when Sam and Cassie were unleashed on the nearest Blockbuster together.

As if on cue, Cassandra and Sam entered the living room, both giggling so hard that their food was in real danger of slipping off their tilting plates and onto the floor. Seeing the two of them together, Janet couldn't help but giggle to herself; they were a handful, but seeing how happy they made one another made all the chaos they caused worthwhile. Eventually they made their way to the couch, fortunately without any dinner-related mishaps, and began jockeying for positions on the couch. With only a marginal amount of jostling, Cassandra managed to win the middle seat on the couch and Sam settled on her right,.

"What are we watching first?" Cassandra asked, picking her chopsticks up off her plate and diving into her food enthusiastically.

"_Ocean's Eleven_," Janet answered immediately. "I don't want to wait twenty minutes while you two fight over seeing Brad or George first."

Grabbing the appropriate case off the table, Sam stood again and made her way over to the DVD player to pop the movie in. Meanwhile, Janet grabbed the blender from the end table beside her and poured its already blended contents into two margarita glasses. Studiously ignoring the pleading look Cassandra was giving her, Janet handed Sam a glass as she returned to the couch. When Sam was settled again, Janet started the movie and Cassandra twisted herself sideways, resting her back against Janet's shoulder and putting her feet on Sam's lap, fortunately before she'd put her plate back on her lap.

"Comfortable?" Janet asked wryly, switching her chopsticks into her left hand and struggling with the mechanics of using them wrong-handed. 

"Extremely," Cassandra replied, twisting slightly to grin at her. 

"How come this couch is so big, yet we always end up piled on top of each other?" Sam asked, balancing her plate on her knees since her lap was now occupied.

"Can't you flip around and lean on Sam's left side, at least until I finish eating?" Janet asked as she dropped most of the food from her chopsticks halfway to her mouth.

"No," Sam replied on the teenager's behalf, leaning forward slightly so she could take a sip of her margarita. 

"Why not?"

"Because its much more fun to watch this way," Sam explained, grinning as Janet dropped her food again.

"Evil," Janet retorted, shooting a mock glare at her best friend.

"Shush! Here comes Brad!" Cassandra exclaimed, effectively ending the conversation for the next two hours.

**A/N: **This chapter sets up the next, but there was really no logical way to tie the two together so I broke them up. Rest assured, I'm already working on the next chapter and I'm hoping to have it up before tomorrow night. 


	14. Chapter 14

The ringing phone cut through the light doze Janet had slipped into, and she sat up, rubbing her eyes as it rang again. Looking to the right, she saw Cassandra and Sam curled up together, giggling away at something, clearly without any intention of answering the phone.

"Please, don't both rush to get up," Janet stated dryly, pushing herself to her feet and feeling a tingle of warmth course through her. Eyeing the mostly empty blender still sitting on the end table beside her, Janet decided that she'd definitely had enough margaritas for the night, no matter how much Sam tried to convince her otherwise.

"We're not answering it on purpose," Cassandra informed her in between giggles, raising her voice to be heard over the persistent, shrill ringing that demanded their attention.

"Why not?" Janet pressed, glancing at the television: Clooney on a weird looking set, which explained the Giggle Twins. Sam was probably ripping apart all the so-called science in the movie and entertaining Cass to no end with her snarky, nit-picking commentary.

"It's just the guys," Sam rolled her eyes before pointing at something on the screen that sent Cassandra off into a fresh wave of giggles. "They'd already left a half a dozen voicemails and five text messages apiece on my cell phone before they started calling the house."

"Did either of you bother to let them know that you wouldn't be going back to the Colonel's tonight?" Janet asked, patiently even as the continued ringing began grating on her nerves. She carefully stepped over two presumably empty soda cans and a half-finished bag of candy as she tried to extricate herself from the mess her living room had become.

"Not yet," Sam replied, pointing at something else in the movie before cracking up completely and taking the teenager along with her.

"Don't you think you should have called them? They're probably worried sick!" Janet exclaimed, disbelief that Sam could be so inconsiderate and irresponsible evident in her tone. To Janet's relief, whichever member of SG-1 was calling had grown impatient and hung up mid-ring. Now they were all able to lower their voices to a more conversational level instead of practically yelling at one another to be heard over the noise from the phone. Or at least, they would have been able to, if only Sam and Cassandra had been able to stop howling at the TV.

"Mom, it's not even 9:30," Cassandra gasped out in between peals of laughter. Janet couldn't see her daughter's eyes, obscured as they were by fingers wiping away laughter-induced tears, but she had heard that tone often enough to know that Cassandra was rolling her eyes.

Checking her watch, Janet saw that it was, in fact, just a few minutes before 9:30 – she was _definitely_ getting too old for this – and suddenly she understood why Sam was being so nonchalant about the whole situation. She wasn't dismissing her teammates' well-intended concern so much as ignoring their complete and utter paranoia. All things considered, Janet couldn't really blame her. The rest of SG-1 had the best intentions, Janet knew, but they were driving Sam crazy. Taking advantage of the first real opportunity that had presented itself in the last few days, Sam was asserting her independence from the rest of her team. Janet understood where Sam was coming from, really she did, but there had to be a better way to go about it.

Preferably one that didn't involve leaving the phone to ring indefinitely and placing three-quarters of SG-1 on medical stand down, having suffered simultaneous acute cardiac episodes.

"They're not going to stop calling just because we don't answer," Janet pointed out. She felt like she was stating the obvious – Sam was well aware of just how stubborn her teammates could be – but _someone_ had to be the voice of reason right now and clearly neither of the pair still curled up on the couch felt any inclination to step up.

The phone began ringing again and Janet decided that this was getting absolutely ridiculous. She'd taken all of two steps towards the phone when someone banged determinedly on the front door. Deciding that the phone could wait two more minutes – they'd waited this long, after all – Janet moved to answer the door instead. As she made her way into the front hall, fresh waves of laughter erupted from the pair curled up on the couch and Janet had to smile.

Making her way through the dark house, Janet carefully navigated her way around the many pairs of shoes scattered throughout the front hall – an occupational hazard of living with a teenage girl – and flicked on the interior light just as another loud knock echoed through the front hallway. Janet unbolted the door and turned the lock as yet another impatient knock rang out. Huffing a sigh of irritation, she managed to open the door all of three inches before it was pushed open the rest of the way and a tangle of bodies tumbled through and into her front hallway. She pressed back flat against the wall and stared in astonishment as the men who had just stormed her house sorted themselves out and took up positions, covering the entrances to the kitchen and the living room, as well as the front door.


	15. Chapter 15

"Don't you people answer the phone anymore?" Jack demanded, snapping his cell phone shut and jamming it into his pocket left-handed as his practiced eyes scanned the front yard for any sign of a threat.

"Is Sam here? My car is in the driveway…" Daniel said anxiously, his concerned eyes raking over the kitchen, alert for anything amiss.

"Good evening, Doctor Frasier, I hope we are not intruding," Teal'c greeted politely, standing guard over the entrance to the living room but without any of the tension that was radiating off the other two.

Janet blinked at the three of them in disbelief. She knew the men in front of her were overprotective of Sam, but this seemed a little extreme, even for them. 

"Well?" Jack prodded, his impatience clear as his eyes moved over the hallway, searching for a sign that his 2IC was still here. His efforts were rendered unnecessary when Sam and Cassandra erupted in fresh waves of giggles a heartbeat later.

"Put those things away!" Janet hissed, her eyes going wide when she realized that Jack and Daniel each had a zat drawn, the older man's pointed out at the street for all the neighbours to see. She took a second glance at Teal'c and noticed a bulge under the left side of his jacket that looked suspiciously zat-shaped. Fortunately he'd had the good sense to keep his holstered. "Are you out of your _minds_?" she demanded.

"Only with worry," Jack snapped, slipping the weapon back into the holster hidden beneath his leather jacket, worn over a solid black t-shirt and black pants. A black toque, pulled low to cover his unruly grey hair, topped off the outfit. In August. 

Assessing glances cast over both Daniel and Teal'c revealed that they too were dressed all in black, right down to the leather jackets and toques. In August. 

No wonder Sam was slowly going crazy living in a house with these three, even temporarily.

"Janet, who's…" Sam called, stopping abruptly as she rounded the corner and took in the sight before her. "Oh you have _got _to be kidding me! What are you doing here with _zats_?"

"Thanks for answering your phone, Carter," Jack said, the sarcasm laced through his words doing little to disguise his anger.

"We've been trying to get in touch with you for almost an hour!" Daniel exclaimed, relief shining at her from his blue eyes.

"Greetings, Major Carter," Teal'c pitched in, dipping his head in her direction. "I am pleased that you are well. As I informed O'Neill and Daniel Jackson on several occasions, I believed that this course of action was unnecessary. However, we journeyed over when it became clear that their concerns would not abate until they were able to ascertain your condition for themselves."

"Please tell me they didn't kick your door in," Sam ignored all three of them and turned pleading eyes on Janet.

"They didn't," Janet assured. Now that she mentioned it though, it was probably a good thing Janet had answered the door before the phone. These three were busy enough repairing Sam's house; they didn't have any extra time to devote to fixing up hers too.

"Are we watching the movie or what?" Cassandra asked impatiently, bumping into Sam's back as she rounded the corner into the front hall. Stepping around the tall woman obstructing her view, Cassandra took in the sight of her three favourite uncles loitering in the front hallway, two of them still in defensive positions. "What's wrong?" she asked, her eyes going wide when they landed on Daniel.

"Apparently nothing," Daniel informed her. Realizing that her gaze was locked on the zat he was still holding at the ready, he tucked the weapon into the waistband of his khakis and folded his arms across his chest.

"Everything's fine, kiddo," Jack reassured her, moving forward and pulling her into a tight hug. He rubbed the teenager's back until he felt her tensed muscles start to relax. 

"Well," Daniel said conversationally after several long minutes of uncomfortable silence. "This is awkward."

"Indeed," Teal'c agreed, the familiar word spoken in that exact tone bringing a smile to everyone's faces and breaking some of the tension that had settled over the room.

"Janet, is it okay if we borrow your backyard for a couple of minutes?" Sam asked, the lingering remnants of a smile still quirking the corners of her lips upwards. She'd known that she'd need to have a talk with her teammates about their hovering eventually, but evidently they needed to have that conversation sooner rather than later. Judging by the dark looks she was getting, Sam suspected there was also a specific conversation that her teammates wanted to have.

"Sure," Janet assented, knowing that they needed an opportunity to clear the air without an audience. "Just keep the yelling to a minimum and for the love of all things holy, do _not_ wave those zats around anymore!" she added. She kept her tone light, but the look on her face made it clear that she was being dead serious. 

"Don't leave without saying goodbye," Cassandra instructed, slipping out of Jack's arms and straight into Teal'c's. 

"We wouldn't dream of it, kiddo," Jack promised.

Once Cassandra had let go, Jack took two steps towards Sam and snagged her by the sleeve. He pinned her with his best Colonel Glare before turning and marching her through the kitchen and out into the backyard. Janet watched Sam go passively enough, but she was under no illusions; there would be more than a bit of yelling once all of SG-1 assembled out in the backyard, and, placid as she might seem right now, Sam would be giving as good as she got once things really got underway.

Settling against Teal'c's familiar bulk, Cassandra had to shift her body to one side when the hard planes of a holstered zat dug into her shoulder. Tilting her head up, brown eyes met brown and she couldn't help but ask for confirmation. "Are you sure everything is okay?"

"All is well, Cassandra Frasier," Teal'c promised, gracing her with a rare smile before releasing her. "Doctor Frasier, I apologize for any inconvenience that has resulted from our presence here this evening," he added for Janet's benefit before turning on his heel and making his way out to the backyard.

"Hey sweetie," Daniel greeted, offering Cassandra a warm hug and dropping a kiss on top of her head. "Sorry for crashing girls' night," he added, including both the teenager and her mother in the apology.

"That's okay," Cassandra grinned. "Sam warned me that might happen. Really, Daniel, how many times do we have to tell you, we _can't_ invite you to girls' nights?"

"You two are nothing but trouble, especially together," Daniel teased, ruffling her hair as he let her go. 

"And you'd do well not to forget it," Cassandra retorted over her shoulder as she skipped back into the living room, leaving Daniel and Janet alone in the hallway.

"Sorry about the dramatic entrance," Daniel apologized bashfully. "We knew we were probably over-reacting, but…"

"… But you care and because you care, you couldn't run the risk of under-reacting," Janet said simply, finishing the thought for him. "Don't worry, I get it."

"We'll be back in a bit," Daniel promised, backing through the kitchen on his way out to the backyard.

"Just don't let Sam and the Colonel get into it _too_ badly," Janet requested. 

"We'll give them a few minutes to get it out of their systems and then re-direct to more productive topics," Daniel agreed. "We _have _done this before, you know."

"I know," Janet replied. "But usually it's Teal'c and Sam doing the refereeing while you and the Colonel have it out. Besides, Sam's pretty frustrated right now and I don't think the chain of command is going to be enough to reign her in like it usually does."

"Heaven help us all," Daniel stated, smiling grimly as he turned and covered the last few feet to the sliding door. He paused only long enough to take a fortifying breath before stepping outside and joining his teammates on the back porch.

**A/N: **I managed to finish this chapter in between class and soccer practice, so I'm posting it now. The next chapter just needs one final going over and then it will be ready for posting, so look for it later tonight or tomorrow morning. Thanks for reading!


	16. Chapter 16

**A/N: **I have to rush to edit this chapter in the half hour break I have between classes, so I apologize in advance for any mistakes. I've done my best to catch any errors, but sometimes they slip through. And now on with the story… Enjoy!

**Descension Back To Normalcy**

"Major," Jack finally growled a full thirty seconds after Daniel had slid the glass door shut and joined the rest of the team out on the back deck. "You'd better have a _damn_ good explanation."

"For what?" Sam asked. The frustration dripping from her words was nothing compared to the waves of it that were rolling off her. "Wanting to go longer than six hours without having anyone breathing down my neck?"

"O'Neill and Daniel Jackson became concerned when you did not return several hours after the local shopping centers had closed for the evening," Teal'c informed her calmly, clasping his hands behind his back. "They wished to ensure that all was well."

"We assumed that you would have called if you were going to stay out," Daniel said, managing to sound more put out than accusatory. He was angry that she had been so irresponsible and inconsiderate, but right now Jack was mad enough for all of them and tag-teaming Sam wouldn't accomplish anything. Actually, it might manage to make her even more furious, but Daniel was pretty sure he should avoid doing _that_ at all costs.

"I'm sorry, I didn't realize living under Colonel O'Neill's roof meant I had a _curfew_," Sam snapped, planting her hands on her hips and turning the full weight of her glare on Daniel.

"And _I_ didn't realize you needed one!" Jack yelled back, throwing his arms out. "Although given your record of downright reckless behaviour lately, maybe it's not such a bad idea!"

"Look Sam," Daniel interjected before Jack could pick up anymore steam. With every second that passed, it seemed less and less likely that they would manage to keep their promise to Janet; there was going to be a _whole_ lot of yelling before this was over. "We realize now that we over-reacted, but at the time, it seemed reasonable. We were expecting you back hours ago and when we couldn't get a hold of you, we panicked." He couldn't keep the trace of anger from weaving its way into his speech, despite his conciliatory words.

"I am a _grown woman_," Sam said, slowly and clearly, as if explaining a very complicated, very foreign concept. "I can take care of myself and, if you'll recall, I do it on a regular basis."

"Not lately, you don't," Jack retorted icily. His eyes were narrowed down to scarcely more than slits and the full force of his glare was leveled at Sam.

"Whose fault is that?" Sam demanded. "_I_ didn't let the NID destroy my house; I wasn't even _there_. You should remember that, _sir_, seeing as you _were _and all."

"The NID wouldn't have had any reason to tear it up if you hadn't been playing house with that damn alien!" he roared, stepping forward and finally unleashing the full force of his fear and anger on the most convenient target.

Daniel and Teal'c exchanged concerned glances in the dim light cast by the moon. So far things were going worse than they'd expected; considering how low their expectations had been, they were understandably concerned.

"Don't you dare," Sam said, her voice low and dangerous as she stalked across the wooden deck to stand toe-to-toe with Jack.

Daniel couldn't help but grimace. Janet had been right; Sam was too worked up to let a little thing like insubordination stop her now. 

"Don't you dare stand there and tell me that it's _my_ fault. I told you, all of you, about Orlin when he first showed up because I _wanted _to get rid of him, but _you_ didn't believe me. You didn't give me a _choice_ but to 'play house', as you so nicely put it. _You_ screwed up! You don't get to lay the blame for that on me!" she raged, her face flushed with anger

"Guys, I think this is a little off-topic," Daniel stepped up, trying to put a bit of distance between them. He didn't for one second believe they'd actually hit one another, but he also didn't think that screaming in one another's faces was going to help much.

"Back off, Daniel," Jack demanded coldly. "After all, the Major here can take care of herself _so well_," he added mockingly, his voice rising again.

"O'Neill," Teal'c warned, his voice low.

"_This_ is exactly what I'm talking about," Sam growled. Her furious words were directed at Teal'c and Daniel but her eyes didn't stray from Jack's. "You need to _stop_ trying to protect me from everything and everyone!"

"Done," Jack snarled. "We can't protect you from the biggest threat to your safety anyway – your own damn pig-headed foolishness!"

"Enough," Daniel snapped, placing a hand on Jack's chest and pushing him back a few steps, putting some space between him and Sam. Looking over his shoulder, Daniel saw that Teal'c had pulled Sam back a few feet and was keeping a hand on her shoulder. Whether Teal'c was restraining or comforting her, Daniel couldn't tell. 

Jack opened his mouth, in all likelihood intending to make another dig at Sam, but Daniel stopped him with an icy look. "Let's all take some deep breaths and calm down before we say anything _else_ we end up regretting."

With a huff, Jack turned away and moved to the solid wood railing, pulling his toque off and running his hands through his already mussed up hair. Daniel kept an eye on him, but it was obvious to all of them that Jack was making a concerted effort to settle down and Daniel didn't seriously expect to have to intervene in any more screaming matches. Daniel's gaze moved over to Sam, watching as she shrugged off Teal'c's hand and slipped her fingers into the back pockets of her jeans, turning her back and trying to collect herself. Daniel shared another look with Teal'c and waited in silence for several moments while the others tried to relax.

"Look," Sam began with a sigh long minutes later. "Not returning any of your calls was stupid and I'm sorry. I wasn't trying to worry you, I just needed some space. That doesn't excuse it though. It was a horrible thing to do and I promise it won't happen again."

"I'm sorry too," Jack sighed, turning to face them all again. "I was _way_ out of line just now."

"Me too," Sam agreed. "I had no right to imply that you stood by and let the NID…"

"It's okay, Carter," Jack said quietly, waving her off with a flick of his wrist. "Let's just forget the last two minutes and move on."

"Okay," Daniel negotiated. "Does this mean we can focus on to the issue that brought us here in the first place?"

"You can't come bursting into places waving _guns_ around just because I don't answer my phone!" Sam exclaimed in exasperation, the calm that had settled over her dissipating quickly. "You _terrified_ Cassandra!"

"O'Neill and Daniel Jackson were not waving the zat'nik'a'tels, Major Carter," Teal'c stated without a trace of humour. "They were, in fact, pointing them."

"I'm not sure that was her point, but that's still very true," Daniel noted. He sought out Teal'c's eyes in the dark and saw a twinkle of amusement shining back at him. Daniel smiled back; trust Teal'c to dispel tension by arguing over semantics. They all knew he had a much better grasp of colloquial Earth English than he let on, but he still managed to feign his ignorance quite convincingly most of the time.

"I know you mean well, I do," Sam began, her eyes roving over each of them in turn. "You guys have been there through everything over the last few days, and I love you for it. But right now, I need to feel like my life is getting back to normal and 'normal' does _not_ involve a few dozen phone calls whenever I'm out of your sight for more than a few hours at a time, or the three of you _hovering_ around me every waking moment of the day."

"We are merely concerned for your well being, Major Carter," Teal'c said quietly, the deep rumble of his voice washing over the moonlit backyard.

"I know," Sam smiled. "And I appreciate it… Even if it didn't really seem like it tonight," she added sheepishly.

"Jack…" Daniel said pointedly, clearly trying to wheedle something out of the older man.

"Daniel…" came the usual reply, spoken with the familiar drawl that warned the subject being hinted at wasn't open to discussion.

"Either you can tell her, or Teal'c and I can, but we're not going back inside until she knows."

"Until I know what?" Sam asked, narrowing her eyes suspiciously.

"Nothing," Jack said firmly, narrowing his own eyes at Daniel.

"I see no reason why we should not tell her," Teal'c offered, weighing in with his opinion.

"Whatever it is, somebody had better tell me," Sam stated firmly, crossing her arms.

Glancing back and forth between Jack and Sam, it became clear to Daniel that Jack had no intention of saying a word and Sam had no intention of letting any of them leave until _somebody_ spilled the beans. 

"We have become so concerned with your whereabouts in light of the threats Colonel Simmons has made against you recently," Teal'c informed Sam, earning him the full force of Jack's glare.

"Simmons is just…" Sam began, rolling her eyes dismissively.

"'Simmons is just' most likely responsible for sending someone to break into your house through one of your brand new windows and spray paint 'any time we want' on every wall of your bedroom," Daniel interjected, locking eyes with her.

Sam stared for a few heartbeats before looking to Teal'c and Jack for confirmation. "Is that true?"

"Reynolds found it two days ago," Jack confirmed with a sigh. "He had the window replaced and kicked everyone out of the room until he'd plastered over the graffiti. We didn't think you really needed to know right away."

"Why would you think I didn't need to know?" Sam asked incredulously, sweeping her gaze over all three of them. 

"Because like you said, Simmons is just…" Jack explained, waving his hands vaguely in front of him to try and convey what exactly it was that the man in question was. "Reynolds reported it to me, and I took it to Hammond. We both agreed that Simmons was just trying to get inside your head. We didn't think it would be a big deal to let you get comfortable in your own house again before we told you. Besides, we weren't exactly planning on letting you out of our sight much for the next little while," he added, only half-joking.

"When we couldn't reach you tonight, we started to worry that Simmons hadn't just been blustering," Daniel concluded.

Sam backed up a few steps and slid down the side of the house, settling herself on the deck. She pulled her knees up to her chest and wrapped her arms around them, examining her denim-covered kneecaps. The men of SG-1 traded concerned glances with one another before Jack finally bit the bullet and moved towards her. Hesitating for a fraction of a second while he prepared himself for the pain it would send through his knees, he joined her on the ground, close enough that his shoulder nudged hers, long legs stretched out in front of him.

"This is nothing new, Carter," Jack reminded gently. "We knew the NID was interested right after Jolinar died."

"But they've never broken into my house before," she argued. "Well, not until recently, anyway," she amended with a wry smile.

"No, they haven't," Daniel agreed, moving to sit on her other side. "But we're pretty sure it only happened because Simmons knew you wouldn't be there."

"Even Simmons isn't dumb enough to think we'd be letting you stay at your place with the condition its in right now," Jack said bluntly. "Playing mind games is just the closest he can come to getting back at you with the President blocking him from bringing you up on charges."

Sam let her head drop back against the wall and took a deep breath. Daniel and Jack shared a look over her head before turning their attention back to her.

"Major Carter," Teal'c murmured, gracefully lowering himself to the ground in front of Sam. "Please understand that we withheld this information only because we believed it was not necessary to burden you with it at this time. It was not our intention to conceal the truth from you indefinitely."

"I know," Sam assured, giving him a tight smile. She dragged in a deep breath of the crisp night air before speaking again. "So, what now?"

"I talked to Hammond," Jack informed her. "He called in a few favours and managed to get his hands on one of the security systems from Area 51 that was decommissioned last year. Siler and a couple of his guys are going to install it over the next couple of days, but it's pretty high tech so it's going to take them a while… We're also going to have to undo some of the work we've already done in order for them to wire up the house properly, but it's no big deal."

"You talked General Hammond into getting me a state of the art, NSA-approved security system for my house?" she asked in disbelief, her eyes going wide as she tried to work out a rough estimate of what such a system would cost.

"No, actually. It was his idea," Jack informed her. He'd been ready to make a similar suggestion and the General had beaten him to it, but Sam didn't need to know that. After all, she couldn't very well subject a two-star general to a tirade about her ability to take care of herself. Some days Jack would kill for General Hammond's immunity to such things… It would _almost_ make all the paperwork worth it. "Besides, they're just sitting around in boxes, collecting dust."

"You're all going to be ridiculously over-protective for the next little while, aren't you?" Sam asked, a ghost of a smile crossing her face as she shook her head at his flippancy.

"Indeed," Teal'c replied warmly.

"I still need space," she advised. "I need to feel like I'm in control. And I need to know that _you _know that I can take care of myself, otherwise I have no business being out in the field with SG-1 once we're back on active duty."

"We understand that," Daniel acquiesced, earning nods of agreement from Jack and Teal'c. "But _we_ need to know that you're safe."

"So, how do we assure ourselves that you're okay without making you feel like we're suffocating you?" Jack asked, leaning his shoulder a bit further into hers.

"Well first off, I'm going to have to insist that you leave the zats back at the SGC… Why you even had them with you tonight, I'll never know," Sam said, managing to joke and chastise at the same time.

"Okay, no zats we can do," Daniel agreed with a smile. That was an easy issue to concede, given that they all owned personal weapons. He refrained from pointing that fact out, though, lest Sam's next demand be that they keep their weapons locked up at home.

"Two calls a day, one in the morning and one at night, on a rotating schedule," Jack proposed.

"Are we not supposed to be brainstorming solutions that do _not_ make Major Carter feel as though we are hovering?" Teal'c asked pointedly before Sam could utter a single syllable of protest.

"One call every morning when we're on downtime for one week or longer," Sam negotiated, smiling gratefully at the gentle giant of a man sitting in front of her.

"And weekends?" Daniel asked.

"No calls," Sam stated firmly.

"No way," Jack argued, shooting that idea down immediately. "One call Friday night and you explain your plans for the weekend. Another call Sunday morning, just to check in and make sure you're okay," he negotiated. 

"I have one father, I don't need three more," Sam said in a singsong voice, warning him that he was pushing it.

"I believe that one phone call on Friday evening would be sufficient," Teal'c stated, coming to her aid again.

"I can live with that," Sam agreed, gracing her ally with another smile.

"So, one call Friday night when we're off for the weekend and one call every morning when we're on downtime for a week or longer," Daniel summarized, looking at each of them in turn and receiving three nods in response. "I can live with that."

"I guess we should probably head inside and prove to Doc that we didn't kill each other. Then _we_," Jack thrust his chin towards Teal'c and Daniel, "Should hit the road so girls' night can start up again." He braced a hand on the deck and moved to push himself to his feet, but his progress was halted before he made it very far.

"Not yet," Sam insisted, resting a hand on Jack's knee to still him. "Let's just stay out here for a little while longer."

"Okay," Daniel agreed, leaning against Sam's shoulder and pushing her further into Jack.

Sam slid her feet under Teal'c's crossed legs, letting his body heat seep into her cold toes, warming them quickly and ratcheting the tingling sensation running through her naquadah-sensitive body up another notch. On either side of her, Jack and Daniel leaned into her even more. They were now squishing her between them but Sam didn't mind. She felt warm and safe nestled in the huddle her teammates had formed around her and she was content to stay there for as long as they would let her.

**A/N: **I think I might be in trouble… This story is now longer than my thesis and there are still at least two more chapters to go: ) Thanks to everyone who's still with me, you're all awesome! 


	17. Chapter 17

**A/N: **Sorry about the wait (blame school, I know I do)! Here's the next chapter for your reading pleasure! The final two chapters just need some minor editing before they're ready for posting, so watch for those over the weekend. The final chapter will be up by Sunday night, I promise! And now on with the show… Enjoy!

**Descension Back To Normalcy**

Sam stood beside Janet in the front hall, watching with mild amusement as Cassandra made the rounds yet again, bouncing back and forth between her three adopted uncles for 'one last hug.' The men indulged her, wrapping her up in tight hugs that, more often than not, lifted her feet clear off the ground. Daniel and Jack both felt guilty about scaring the teenager earlier and were obviously trying to make it up to her. Sam and Janet suspected that Teal'c was picking Cassandra off the ground simply to show off. Regardless of the motivations behind the enthusiastic hugs, the teenager wasn't complaining, basking in their attention and squealing in surprise whenever her feet left the ground.

"Cass, I think they'd like to actually make it out the door sometime before sunrise," Janet finally intervened with a smile. She wasn't sure who looked more disappointed, her daughter or the three men.

"Why don't you and your mom drop by one night this week for a barbeque?" Jack suggested, wrapping Cassandra up in one last hug. For real this time.

"Mom?" Cassandra pleaded hopefully, twisting awkwardly in Jack's arms so she could give Janet her most convincing puppy dog eyes.

"Thursday?" Janet suggested, mentally running through her schedule as well as the mission rotation for the next few days. Unless something had come up since she'd left the base yesterday – she'd be the first to admit that it was entirely possible something of galactic importance had arisen – she had a pretty light week ahead of her.

"Sounds good," Jack agreed, kissing Cassandra on the forehead and breaking off the hug. "Okay, kiddo, we've really got to go now. I'm old and it's _way_ past my bedtime."

With an eye roll, Cassandra released him and stepped back to stand beside her mom, snuggling into Janet's side and wrapping an arm around her waist.

Once he was certain he wouldn't be in trouble for leaving before Cassandra was done hugging him, Teal'c nodded to the two women in the hall and slipped out the door. He, Daniel and Jack had been trying to leave for over five minutes now, and there had been so many false starts to their departure that there was really no need to vocalize his goodbyes yet again. 

"Call before you leave in the morning," Jack instructed Sam. He waited for a nod before following Teal'c out the door, calling over his shoulder, "Sweet dreams ladies. If ever you actually get to bed, that is." 

"Night," Daniel wished them all, grabbing Sam up in a quick hug. He squeezed her once before letting go and stepping outside, pulling the front door shut behind him. He blinked several times to let his eyes adjust to the sudden darkness before moving across the porch and making his way down to the driveway. He was halfway to the truck when the front door opened again, warm yellow light bleeding out into the dark night. Turning, he spotted Sam on the front porch, silhouetted by the light spilling into the inky blackness of the night.

"Sir!" Sam's voice rang out, halting Jack just as he was swinging himself up into his truck. "Can I have a minute?"

Jack hopped back down to the ground, wincing at the discomfort the action sent through both his knees. Shaking off the lingering twinges, he retraced his steps back up the path leading to the house, slipping past Daniel as the younger man continued on his way to the truck. Jack met Sam halfway and shoved his hands in his pockets, rocking back on his heels and pinning her with an expectant look.

"I wanted to say how sorry I am…"

"I'm serious, Carter," Jack said calmly. "Don't sweat it."

"But…"

"Look," he interrupted, his voice pitched low but carrying easily on the gentle breeze that rustled through the quiet night. "We both said some things that we're not proud of tonight. I'm not taking any of it personally though, and neither should you. Obviously we still have a few issues that we need to work out, and we will, but not tonight."

"Promise?" she murmured hopefully. She knew he had mastered the art of evasion long ago, and the last thing she wanted was to let the only opportunity she might ever get to actually talk to him about their argument slip away.

Jack was taken aback at how young she looked in that moment. Usually, when she was spouting more technobabble than most people could learn in a lifetime, or handling a weapon with the same ease as Teal'c with all his decades of field experience, it was easy to forget how young she still was. But other times – like right now, when she was looking at him through wide, hopeful eyes – he was reminded that she wasn't even 32 yet. With all the incredible things she'd accomplished in her life, it still amazed him when she looked at him like that, as though earning his approval and respect were the most significant things she'd ever set out to accomplish. 

"Promise," he reassured, stepping forward and pulling her into a tight hug. He smiled when she leaned into him, her arms going around him and squeezing him tight. He held her for a few moments and rubbed one hand over her back, the gentle friction warming her chilled skin through the thin material of her t-shirt. "You shouldn't be out here without shoes or a jacket," he scolded gently. "Head back inside and…"

"… And lock the door behind me. I know," Sam completed the sentence for him. He didn't need to see her face, he could hear the smile in her voice; her earlier frustration at their overprotective behaviour was gone.

"Go," he instructed, releasing her only to grab her by the shoulders and spin her around to face the house. 

"Good night, sir," Sam called over her shoulder, appeasing him as she started up the front path.

"Night," he replied. His eyes followed her up the path and watched until she was safely inside before turning and climbing into his truck. He kept an eye on the house, waiting until he saw the light in the hallway flick off before pulling the door shut.

"Is all well, O'Neill?" Teal'c asked from the passenger seat, studying the man beside him for any sign of deception as they all fastened their seatbelts.

"Everything's fine," Jack assured, slipping the key into the ignition and starting up the engine.

"Are _you_ all right?" Daniel pressed from the back seat, his mind straying back to the acerbic barbs Jack and Sam had traded earlier. 

"Fine," Jack repeated, glancing over his shoulder and backing carefully out of the narrow driveway. "Just really, _really_ tired."

The trio lapsed into silence, making the drive back to Jack's house in silence. The drive back took a lot longer than the trip there had, owing to the fact that Jack was actually obeying traffic laws this time around, but none of them minded the extra time it took. They were content to make the trip in the quiet of their shared relief; their fourth member was still safe and sound and they had made plans aimed at keeping her that way. 


	18. Chapter 18

**Descension Back To Normalcy**

Grabbing two beers from the fridge, Jack removed the bottle caps with practiced ease and tossed them on the counter. Casting a glance out the window over the sink, his eyes landed on his 2IC, hunched over her knees out on his back deck. With a deep breath, Jack decided to bite the bullet and go talk to her now. Daniel and Teal'c would only be gone for another two hours or so, and Jack figured that the more one-on-one time they for this particular discussion, the better. 

His mind made up, he walked over to the sliding glass door and joined her out in the backyard, blinking several times as his eyes adjusted to the harsh mid-afternoon sunshine before padding across the warm wood in his bare feet. 

Sam didn't look up as he approached, so he pressed one of the cold glass bottles to the back of her neck, unable to resist the temptation of teasing the patch of bare skin. She started, jerking away from the bottle with a not quite suppressed yelp. Tossing a playful glare over her shoulder, she held out an expectant hand and wrapped her fingers around the proffered bottle. She would rather have forced him into a complete disarmament, but she'd take what she could get. 

Settling himself beside her on the top step leading down to the yard, Jack pressed his shoulder against hers, biting back a ghost of a smile when she pressed back lightly. He took a long pull from his beer before speaking. "We need to talk." 

"Yes, sir, we do," Sam agreed, running a finger around the mouth of the bottle she was precariously balancing on one knee. 

"Actually, Colonel O'Neill's not here right now," Jack stated. When she looked up at him in confusion, he continued, "But Jack would really like the chance to talk to Sam." 

"Okay," she nodded in understanding. By removing their respective ranks from the situation, he was putting them on equal footing and granting her free-reign to speak her mind, which she appreciated. 

"I think you've got some questions you'd like to ask me?" he prompted, trying to get the ball rolling. 

"Why did you…" she began hesitantly. Changing her mind partway through, she snapped her mouth shut and fell silent. 

"Ask me," he urged quietly. "We need to clear the air before we can even think about going back out in the field together." 

"How could you standby and let the NID destroy my house?" she asked, finally giving voice to the question that had been plaguing her since she'd seen the total devastation that had been wrought on her home. 

"Wait, you _seriously_ think I was there for that?" Jack asked, turning his disbelief filled eyes on her. 

"You weren't?" 

"No!" he stated emphatically. "Within ten seconds of seeing the mini-gate in your basement, I was out the door and on my way back to the SGC. I was hoping I would beat Simmons back to the base and sort everything out with Hammond before he poked his nose into it. Unfortunately, it took you longer than I'd hoped to get back, and by the time you came through, Simmons was already railing away at Hammond and the President." 

"Oh," she said quietly, processing this new information. Her fingers began picking at her beer's label for lack of anything else to fiddle with and her attention turned out towards the yard, rather than the man sitting beside her. 

"Yeah," Jack agreed quietly, taking another sip of his beer and shifting uncomfortably. 

The pair lapsed into silence for a few minutes, each lost in thought. They didn't look at one another; in fact, they were focusing most of their attention on not meeting one another's gaze. Jack could have almost convinced himself that they were simply two people enjoying the late August afternoon, if it weren't for the tension that rippled between them. More than anything, he wanted to crack a joke and break the strained silence, but he knew that Sam was gathering her thoughts and he was loathe to interrupt her. Instead, he settled for studiously examining the birds that flitted from tree to tree through his yard and tried hard not to count each second that went by without a word passing between them. 

"I still can't get over the fact that you didn't believe me," Sam finally murmured, breaking the silence. "I've been trying to put myself in your shoes and see where you were coming from, and I know I said I understood, but… I'm still struggling with why it was so hard to believe that an_ invisible friend_ followed us back home. It's not exactly the first time it's happened," she reminded, alluding to the Reetu as much as she could without compromising SGC security. 

Heaving a sigh, Jack drummed his fingers on the side of his beer bottle and tried to answer the question that had been weighing on both of their minds for days. He could have named any of a dozen reasons, but the more he thought about it, the more he realized that they could all be traced back to one simple fact. 

"I was waiting for the proof," he finally replied, watching his restless fingers beat their tattoo against the smooth glass. 

"Proof," she said flatly, clearly disappointed that he had no better explanation to offer. 

"Yeah, I mean, you're the scientist, Carter," he elaborated. "You've always got proof; scans and test results and laws of physics, even when you _do_ have to rewrite them yourself. Even if it's just a series of long, complicated equations that only you understand, there's always proof to back up what you tell me. This time, there wasn't." 

"I guess that's fair," she murmured. That a lack of evidence to support her claims was his main reason for not believing her was reassuring somehow. It showed that he had trusted her all along; it was the fact that she hadn't been acting like her logical, scientifically minded self that had led to his skepticism, not any doubt he had in her. 

"Can I ask you something?" Jack ventured. A slight turn of his head allowed him to spot her answering nod out of his peripheral vision. "When you did have proof, why didn't you come to me?" 

"What…" 

"He gave you proof after we took down the cameras," he pointed out. "We would have had to confirm that it was authentic, but you had to know that emerald he made would have been pretty convincing evidence." 

"Maybe," she conceded. The words she didn't say hung in the air between them: she had been afraid of coming to him with hard evidence only to be rebuffed again. 

"Or when he… descended, I guess," Jack pressed. "The way I understand it, he couldn't have re-ascended afterwards, so he couldn't have made himself invisible again. You could have brought him into the SGC at any point after that." 

"If I'd done that, he would have just pretended to be a regular guy from Earth," Sam argued. "And you would have sent me to MacKenzie to be re-assessed." Seeing aliens around every corner was not a good sign, even at the SGC. Given that her sanity had already been in question, she hadn't given much thought to presenting the fully corporeal Orlin to the SGC, where he would have simply denied her claims and probably been on his merry way before she was finished with her next psych eval. 

"Good point." 

"Are we going to be okay? I mean, really okay?" Sam asked hesitantly after a few heartbeats of silence, afraid of what his answer might be. 

"As far as I'm concerned, we already are," he assured, finally turning his head to look at her properly. 

His eyes locked with hers and he watched her war with herself, torn between giving up on the last of the hurt and anger that had been lurking beneath her calm, collected exterior for the better part of the last few days or hanging on to that tumult of emotion for a while longer. When her eyes became glassy and she sucked in a shaky breath, Jack knew which side had won. 

"C'mere," he instructed gently, removing the beer from her hand and setting the bottles on his other side. Turning his upper body to face hers, he opened his arms to her. 

Sam twisted herself sideways on the step and leaned forward, gratefully accepting the hug he offered. Resting her forehead in the crook of his neck, she reached around behind him and laid her hands flat on his back, sliding her palms up until she could press his shoulders closer to her. Closing her eyes, she relaxed into him, letting the arm wrapped tightly around her waist and the thumb that rubbed soothingly over the base of her neck finally convince her that they had moved beyond the rough patch SG-1 had hit in the last few weeks. 

Squeezing her tightly, Jack pressed his cheek against the side of her head and breathed deeply, letting the last of the tension that had built up over the last few days dissipate. He'd worried that the harsh words spoken at Janet's house two days ago would come back to haunt him, yet all it had taken was a few brief explanations and he'd earned her forgiveness without any mention of the horrible things he'd said that night. Turning his head, he pressed a gentle kiss into her hair and yet again thanked his lucky stars that she was so forgiving of his frequently short temper and sharp tongue. 

"I wish we'd done this days ago," Sam confessed quietly. 

"Yes, well," Jack replied lightly. "Let's not dwell." 

Sam chuckled and slowly pulled out of his arms, leaving him no choice but to release her. She planted her hands on the stair beneath her and pushed herself to her feet, blinking rapidly to clear the handful of relieved tears that were still threatening to fall. 

"Where are you going?" Jack demanded, not quite pouting at her. Colonels did _not_ pout, but sometimes, when they really wanted to get their own way, they came pretty close. 

"Just getting comfortable," she informed him with a smile, moving down two steps and sitting on the one below his feet. Stretching her long legs out in front of her and letting the lush grass tickle the bottoms of her bare feet, she leaned back and rested her back against his legs. 

"Well then, by all means, please, get comfortable," he replied, a matching smile playing on his lips. 

Tilting her head back to rest against Jack's bent knees, Sam closed her eyes and basked in the late summer sunshine, the light breeze occasionally ruffling through her hair. Jack took advantage of the opportunity to study her and was pleased to see that the faint lines of tension that had been etched around her eyes since returning from Velona had finally disappeared. Jack carefully eased himself backwards, moving slowly so as not to disturb Sam, and lay his upper body down on the sun-warmed wood of the deck. His squinted eyes roved the sky as he lounged, taking in the wisps of white that slowly drifted overhead, carried on the gentle breeze that danced across his skin every once in a while. 

For the first time in weeks, Jack truly believed that things were good between him and Sam. They had finally had the heart-to-heart they had so desperately needed; the tension that had lingered after each previous conversation touching on recent events was absent now. They'd managed to resolve their issues with a few days to go before they returned to active duty, leaving them free to enjoy their remaining downtime with Daniel and Teal'c, as well as each other. 

**A/N:** All right people, we're almost there! There's just one more chapter to go. Once again, a huge thank you to everyone who has stuck with this story and cookies for everyone who has reviewed!! : ) 


	19. Chapter 19

**A/N:** We did it: I actually finished the longest thing I've ever written and you had the patience to wait for me to do it! Yay Team Us!! Once again, a tremendously huge thank you to everyone who read and reviewed! You're all phenomenal!! : )

**Descension Back To Normalcy**

Two and a half weeks after the clean up at Sam's house had begun, everything had finally been repaired and replaced. In recent days, all the walls had been painted (only one had been covered in multi-coloured stripes before Sam lost her composure and her teammates had realized she had, in fact, been joking), new carpets and tiling had been laid down throughout, and the new furniture and appliances had been delivered and set up in the proper rooms. In addition, the security system appropriated from storage at Area 51 had been installed, wired to send alerts via General Hammond's office line and Jack's cell phone in the event that security was breached. All in all, it had taken a monumental group effort, but the house was finally inhabitable again and, much to the relief of the male members of SG-1, quite possibly the most secure residential building on the entire planet.

Out in the backyard, everyone who had been involved in the clean up effort was gathered for a joint housewarming/thank you party, many with significant others and children in tow. The tarps that had become a fixture in the yard had been taken down earlier in the day and four barbeques had been set up against the back fence. The adjacent fences were lined with more than two dozen coolers, all filled with a variety of beer, sodas and bottled water, plus enough ice to hopefully keep the drinks cold despite the heat of the late August afternoon.

"Um, everyone?" Sam called loudly, trying and failing to make herself heard over the many conversations being held simultaneously. "Could I have everybody's attention for a second?"

Seeing that most people hadn't heard her favourite aunt's request, Cassandra hopped up on one of the many picnic tables scattered throughout the yard and let out a piercing whistle, just the way Jack had taught her to do years ago. When she had everyone's attention she shouted, "Hey everybody! Sam wants to say something!"

Blushing but trying in vain to hide it, Sam threw a grateful smile at Cassandra before speaking. "I just wanted to thank you for all of your help with the house. I know how long it took everybody working together to get it back to inhabitable… I can't imagine how long it would have taken me to do it all by myself," Sam grimaced at the thought before continuing, "I'm sorry you all have to eat my 'cooking' again," she added mischievously, "But if you thought my delivery pizza and Chinese for two and a half weeks was brutal, my barbequed hamburgers and hot dogs are to die for."

She earned the hoped for laughter and, on that light note, everyone resumed their conversations. With a smile, Sam scanned the crowd, once more overwhelmed by the sheer number of people who had sacrificed their precious off-duty time to help her out in the last few weeks. She'd always considered herself lucky to work with these people every day, but now she realized she was even luckier to be able to call most of them friends.

A tap on her shoulder pulled Sam from her thoughts. Turning, she found Daniel behind her, squinting a bit in the bright sunshine. "Hey," she greeted with a broad grin.

"Hey yourself," he replied, a matching grin lighting his face. "Can you tear yourself away from the grill for a few moments and come inside?"

"Sure," Sam replied, grabbing his hand and leading him to the back door, weaving her way through the various clusters of people scattered through the yard. "What's inside?"

"The sooner you go inside, the sooner you'll find out," Cassandra said, not quite whining, but almost, overhearing the question as the pair approached her position near the back door. Sam smiled fondly as a remnant of the clingy little girl that SG-1 had found on another planet all those years ago peeked out from behind the independent teenager façade.

"Ladies," Daniel reprimanded, the sternness permeating his voice was undermined by the smile still on his face. "Less talk, more walk!"

"Aye aye, sir!" Cassandra mock saluted as she pulled the screen door open. Daniel reached over her head and held the door open, gesturing for her and Sam to precede him inside.

Sam snatched the girl's hand in her free one as she entered the house, pulling her in behind her. "You need to respect your elders, young lady. And not go Navy," she added, teasing good-naturedly. "Colonel O'Neill would disown you."

"When's the last time you did what your father told you to? Or Grandpa George?" Cassandra asked cheekily, checking over her shoulder to make sure Daniel was still following. "And I'd like to remind you that Uncle Teal'c is more than triple your age – how much respect do you give him?" she continued, pulling ahead to drag Sam and, by extension, Daniel into the kitchen.

"Indeed, Cassandra Frasier, I get no respect," Teal'c said lightly from his position near the brand new fridge, a slight smile playing on his lips.

"S'about time," Jack stated from his place leaning against the kitchen counter, his fingers impatiently drumming on the underside of the counter's lip. "I was beginning to think Danny went out to get you, caught a whiff of someone's beer and passed out."

"There's nothing wrong with a cheap date, Colonel," Janet drawled from his side. The pair exchanged knowing smiles and Janet waited for a nod from Jack before stepping away from the counter in sync with him. On the brand new counter behind them sat a large white box with an enormous white bow on it.

"What's this?" Sam asked in surprise, casting glances at everyone in the room in search of a hint.

"Most people would open it in order to find out," Daniel pointed out helpfully, gently pushing her towards the counter.

"Guys, you shouldn't have," Sam admonished, looking around the room. "After everything you've done…"

"Sam, please open it," Cassie begged, bouncing in place with apparently uncontainable excitement.

Shooting wary glances at the beaming archaeologist, smirking Colonel, impassive Jaffa, impatient teenager and bemused doctor, Sam approached the counter. She carefully untied the ribbon holding the bow in place and unwound it from the box. Setting the silky strands of ribbon on the counter, Sam bit back a smile. "I should really wait to open this until after I've fed everyone," she stated, knowing full well that the others wouldn't stand for it.

Her statement was met with cries of 'Sam!' and 'Carter!' spoken with varying degrees of annoyance, impatience and whine. Teal'c simply stepped behind her and stood with his arms out to either side of his body. He didn't say a word, but his stance made his thoughts clear: 'to get outside you must get past me and I have no intention of allowing this to transpire.'

Happy with the reaction she received, Sam finally removed the lid from the box and placed it next to the bow on the counter. Gently peeling back several layers of delicate baby blue tissue paper, she finally caught a glimpse of the box's contents. A wave of recognition washed over her and she gasped in surprise, her fingertips hesitantly dancing over the familiar fabric.

"You found it," Sam whispered, looking around the room through tear-filled eyes. "When I didn't see it in the backyard, I thought someone had just thrown it out right away, not realizing what it was."

"Take it out of the box," Jack instructed gently, sending a warm smile her way.

Doing as she was told, Sam carefully lifted her mother's wedding dress out of the box. As she did so, more and more of the dress was revealed, dry and whole. As the last of the train left the box, Sam draped the material over her right arm and ran her eyes over the family heirloom she'd truly believed she'd never see again.

"I figured they would have trashed it too," she said quietly, lovingly fingering the lace overlay on the bodice of the dress as she blinked back tears.

"They did, but one of my neighbours is a seamstress," Daniel explained, stepping around Teal'c and moving to stand beside Jack so he could better see her face. "She got the general idea of how it was supposed to look from your parents' wedding photos and then sewed it all back together."

Sam carefully folded the layers of white material and placed it back in the box, leaving the lid off so that she could still see the dress. Wiping at her eyes, she turned and surprised Teal'c by mauling him in an enthusiastic bear hug. Despite the unexpectedness of the hug, Teal'c didn't miss a beat, wrapping his huge arms around her and squeezing once before releasing her, a smile on his face.

Moving on, Sam shared a tight hug with Janet, murmuring her gratitude in a voice still thick with tears.

"Mostly Cass and I just wrapped it," Janet whispered back. "Your guys came up with the idea," she added, stepping back with a smile as Cassandra bounded forward to take her place

"Thanks, sweetie," Sam smiled at Cassandra, wrapping her arms around the excited girl and holding her close.

"It's okay?" Cassandra asked, a hint of scepticism in her voice.

"It's perfect," the blonde woman assured, smiling down at her. Sam dropped a kiss on Cassandra's forehead before breaking off the hug.

Navigating around the other's standing in the kitchen, Sam made her way over to hug the two people most likely responsible for masterminding the salvaging of her mother's wedding dress.

"Those _are_ happy tears, right, Carter?" Jack inquired as her arms snaked around his waist, his own arms wrapping around her back.

"Yes, sir," Sam smiled, squeezing him tightly.

"Just checking," he replied. He tightened his arms around her for a few seconds before letting her go, a smile on his face once more.

Slipping out of Jack's embrace, Sam turned to Daniel and stepped into his wide open arms. Wrapping her arms around his neck, she hugged him as tightly as she could, her smile growing when his arms folded around her.

"Thank you," Sam whispered, her mouth next to his ear. "You don't know how much the dress means to me since she died."

"I have a pretty good idea," he argued with a smile. Unwrapping one arm from around her, he turned her 90 degrees so she faced the others and leaned her side against his chest before wrapping his arm around her waist to hold her body in place. His other arm went back to rest on the counter behind him, bracing himself as Sam leaned further into him. He pretended not to notice when she reached up and quickly wiped at her eyes, nor when she sniffled quietly.

"So kids," Jack began, sharing a smile with the only actual kid in the room as the adults rolled their eyes.

"What on earth are we going to do with every waking moment now that this place is inhabitable again?"

"We've got that mission to P3X 471 the day after tomorrow," Daniel reminded, tilting his head back for a moment so Sam could tuck her head under his chin. "That'll keep us busy."

"And I'm sure _I'll_ be kept busy when you come back needing me to piece all of _you_ back together from photos and then sew you back up," Janet stated wryly. The mission was supposed to be a simple mineral survey, but nothing was ever 'simple' when SG-1 was involved. More often than not, it was the milk runs that got the team into the most trouble.

"Meanwhile _I'll_ be getting ready to go back to school," Cassie grumbled unhappily. "And yes, I _will_ be taking AP English, Spanish, history, bio, chem, physics and math," she added before anyone could inquire about her courses. As she rhymed them off, she shot pointed looks at the people she was appeasing with her choices, namely Daniel, Janet and Sam.

"Think fast," Sam said with a sadistic grin, looping her arms loosely around Daniel's waist. "Cosine law?"

"Choice of hungry marines plus choice of evil aunt equals poor little Cassandra going outside to face a starving mob," Cassandra quipped, making a break for the door before the quizzing could start in earnest.

"What about…" Jack called after her retreating back.

"Baseball, hockey and track teams, Uncle Jack," she called in exasperation, knowing what the question would be before he could even finish asking it. "Just like every other year."

"That's my girl!" he replied proudly, beaming at the others. "What?" he shrugged when three-quarters of the people left in the room rolled their eyes. "She knows school comes first, I just want to make sure she has some time to play too."

Around her, Sam's friends began reminiscing about their own high school experiences, much to Teal'c's amusement. She didn't contribute, merely allowing their familiar voices to wash over her and giggling occasionally at the antics the others had gotten up to as teenagers. As she listened to the silly stories and easy banter, she realized that as long as she had the unwavering love and support of her friends, she really could survive anything. At that, she had to smile.

_Oh yes,_ she thought humorously, _as long as they're with me, I can survive glowing aliens that make themselves invisible to everyone but me, everyone thinking I've completely lost it, the government spying on me, a team of ten male strangers rifling through my underwear drawer, impending Armageddon and irate members of the Pentagon and NID baying for my blood. _

"Carter, everything okay?" Jack asked suddenly, interrupting her thoughts, his concern clear. "You spaced out on us for a minute there."

"Yes sir," Sam replied, gracing him with a full-blown grin. "I'm perfectly fine."

And for the first time in over a month, she really was.

**A/N 2**: Quite a few people have asked, so I've decided that I will be writing a sequel to this story, involving NID evilness and bad things. Before I can start writing though, I need to finish off my thesis, so I probably won't start posting the sequel until mid- to late-April. Keep your eyes pealed for it! : )


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